Toolbar Image Strips (Business/Site License Only)

Using IcoFX you can create and edit toolbar image strips.

About Image Strips ContentTop

Toolbar image strips are large bmp or png files that contain all the images of a toolbar in one single file. Developers use image strips to populate the images of the toolbar buttons. While you can set the image of toolbar buttons individually it is much easier to set all the images in a single step using image strips.

Toolbar Image Strip
A 32 bit toolbar image strip containing 24x24 images

While most modern programming languages support 32 bit semitransparent image strips older programming languages need 4, 8 or 24 bit image strips. In 24 bit or less image strips the transparency is represented by a single color. You cannot use this color in your image since it will be displayed as transparent in the toolbar button. IcoFX handles the transparent color automatically. When you load a toolbar image strip the transparent color will be displayed by IcoFX as real transparency. Also when saving a 24 bit or less image strip IcoFX will automatically fill the transparent areas with the selected color. You can change the color that will be transparent using the "Transparent Color" dialog of IcoFX.

Toolbar Image Strip
A 4 bit image strip where the magenta color represents the transparency

Working With Image Strips ContentTop

To create an new toolbar image strip use the "File/New/New Toolbar Image Strip..." menu item. This will open the New Toolbar Image Strip dialog.

New Toolbar
New Toolbar Image Strip Dialog

On the New Toolbar Image Strip dialog select the desired size and bit count of the toolbar image strips. An image strip consists of more images. Each image represents the icon of a toolbar button.

In IcoFX each image of the image strip is displayed in the sidebar of the canvas window. You can see that the images are numbered. This is done to make it easier to identify a given image, since when the image strips are used in a programming language they will be automatically indexed. You can reorder the images inside the image strip simply by dragging them in the sidebar.

When you open an image strip IcoFX detects that it is an image strip and prompts you to open it as such. When it is opened then the image strip is cut allowing you to edit the images separately. You can select the image you want to edit in the sidebar of the canvas window.

When the image strip is saved then the individual images are glued together by IcoFX resulting the final image strip. The image strip can be saved as a png or bmp image.

The "Image/Image Strip" menu contains useful commands for image strips like:

  • Duplicate Image - Duplicates the selected image
  • Move Image Up - Moves the selected image up
  • Move Image Down - Moves the selected image down
  • Reverse Images - Reverse the order of the images in the image strip.

To easily add new images to an image strip you can drag images from the Explorer panel to the sidebar of the canvas window. The image will be added to the image strip.

Transparent Color ContentTop

You can select the transparent color of an image strip using the "transparent Color" dialog.

Transparent Color
Transparent Color Dialog

For 32 bit image strips there is no need to set a transparent color since the transparency information is already stored in the image.

For 24, 8 and 4 bit images you can select the transparent color using the "Transparent Color" dialog. This dialog will let you select a color from the palette of the image. The dialog will warn you if the selected color is already used in the image. It is recommended to choose an unused color as transparent color since the given color will be displayed as transparent. When the 24 bit or lower image strip is saved then the transparent area will be filled with the selected color in the saved image strip.


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