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Thejavax.imageio.ImageIO
class provides a set of static convenience methods that perform most simple Image I/O operations.Reading an image that is in a standard format (GIF, PNG, or JPEG) is simple:
File f = new File("c:\images\myimage.gif"); BufferedImage bi = ImageIO.read(f);
The format of the image will be auto-detected by the API based on the contents of the file. Most image files contain a "magic number" in their first few bytes that identifies the file format. For formats that do not have a magic number, auto-detection may fail and somewhat more sophisticated application code will be needed.Additional formats may be handled by installing JAR files containing plug-ins; the details are described in the next chapter. Once a plug-in has been installed, a new format will be understood automatically without any changes to the application code.
The set of formats available for reading can be obtained by calling
ImageIO.getReaderFormatNames
. This will return an array ofString
s containing the names of the available formats, such as "gif" and "png."Writing an image in a supported format is equally simple:
BufferedImage bi; File f = new File("c:\images\myimage.png"); ImageIO.write(im, "png", f);
The list of supported formats may be obtained by callingImageIO.getWriterFormatNames
.