MultiColored Graphics Text

Multi-Colored Text

Add a Little More Pizzaz to Graphics Text

- JanetTerra
You can define the color of your graphics text with the graphics COLOR command. There are the 16 defined colors and as well as Buttonface, the default background color.

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Liberty BASIC's 16 Named Colors

• Yellow
• Brown
• Red
• Darkred
• Pink
• Darkpink
• Blue
• Darkblue
• Green
• Darkgreen
• Cyan
• Darkcyan
• White
• Black
• Lightgray (also called Palegray)
• Darkgray

The COLOR command works with a Graphics Window or Graphicbox .

 Open "My Graphics" for Graphics as #g 

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The COLOR Command Using a Named Color

 Print #g, "Color Blue" 

or

 hue$ = "Blue" 
 Print #g, "Color ";hue$ 

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The COLOR Command Using an RGB Color

Beyond the named colors are the RGB colors. RGB colors are composites of Red, Green and Blue. Each of the three colors can hold values of 0 - 255.

 Print #g, "Color 128 0 255" 

or

 redHue = 128 
 greenHue = 0 
 blueHue = 255 
 Print #g, "Color ";redHue;" ";greenHue;" ";blueHue 

or

 hue$ = "128 0 255" 
 Print #g, "Color ";hue$ 

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Only one color can be used at a time, but, by layering colors, some very interesting effects can be achieved. The following demo

1. Gets a bitmap of the entire graphics window (pic1)
2. Selects a new color for the text
3. Draws the text in the new color
4. Gets a bitmap of a portion of the graphics window (pic)
5. Draws pic1
6. Overlays pic1 with pic2
7. Begins again with Step 1

This loop continues for the height of the text. All drawing is DISCARD ed until the final drawing is captured with the GETBMP command, displayed with the DRAWBMP command and FLUSH ed to conserve memory. Memory is further conserved with a combination of SEGMENT and DELSEGMENT commands.

 Nomainwin 
 WindowWidth = 757 
 WindowHeight = 554 
 UpperLeftX = Int((DisplayWidth - WindowWidth) /2) 
 UpperLeftY = Int((DisplayHeight - WindowHeight) /2) 
 
 Menu #demo, "&Options", "E&xit", MenuExit 
 Graphicbox #demo.gb1, 0, 0, 750, 500 
 
 Open "Rainbow Text" for Window as #demo 
 #demo, "Trapclose TrapExit" 
 #demo.gb1, "Down; Fill Lightgray; Flush" 
 #demo.gb1, "Getbmp pic 0 0 750 500" 
 
 Call RainbowText "Rainbow Colors", "Verdana 32 Bold", 80, 100 
 Call VarigatedText "Varigated Blue", "Courier_New 54 Bold Italic", 70, 200 
 
 Wait 
 
 Sub TrapExit handle$ 
 Close #handle$ 
 End 
 End Sub 
 
 Sub MenuExit 
 Call TrapExit "#demo" 
 End Sub 
 
 Sub RainbowText text$, textFont$, textLLX, textLLY 
 Unloadbmp "pic" 
 #demo.gb1, "Font ";textFont$ 
 FontHeight = FontHeight(textFont$) 
 yUpper = textLLY - FontHeight 
 yLower = textLLY + Int(FontHeight / 2) 
 For y = yLower to yUpper Step -3 
 #demo.gb1, "Getbmp pic1 0 0 750 500" 
 redHue = Int(Rnd(1) * 256) 
 greenHue = Int(Rnd(1) * 256) 
 blueHue = Int(Rnd(1) * 256) 
 #demo.gb1, "Backcolor Lightgray" 
 #demo.gb1, "Color ";redHue;" ";greenHue;" ";blueHue 
 #demo.gb1, "Place ";textLLX;" ";textLLY 
 #demo.gb1, "\";text$ 
 #demo.gb1, "Getbmp pic2 0 0 750 ";y 
 #demo.gb1, "Drawbmp pic1 0 0" 
 #demo.gb1, "Drawbmp pic2 0 0" 
 #demo.gb1, "Discard" 
 Next y 
 #demo.gb1, "Getbmp pic 0 0 750 500" 
 #demo.gb1, "Drawbmp pic 0 0" 
 #demo.gb1, "Segment segID" 
 #demo.gb1, "Flush" 
 #demo.gb1, "Delsegment ";segID - 1 
 End Sub 
 
 Sub VarigatedText text$, textFont$, textLLX, textLLY 
 Unloadbmp "pic" 
 FontHeight = FontHeight(textFont$) 
 #demo.gb1, "Font ";textFont$ 
 yUpper = textLLY - FontHeight - 2 
 yLower = textLLY + Int(FontHeight / 2) 
 hueInc = Int(256 / FontHeight) * 2 
 blueHue = 0 
 For y = yLower to yUpper Step -2 
 #demo.gb1, "Getbmp pic1 0 0 750 500" 
 blueHue = Min(255, blueHue + hueInc) 
 #demo.gb1, "Backcolor Lightgray" 
 #demo.gb1, "Color 0 0 ";blueHue 
 #demo.gb1, "Place ";textLLX;" ";textLLY 
 #demo.gb1, "\";text$ 
 #demo.gb1, "Getbmp pic2 0 0 750 ";y 
 #demo.gb1, "Drawbmp pic1 0 0" 
 #demo.gb1, "Drawbmp pic2 0 0" 
 #demo.gb1, "Discard" 
 Next y 
 #demo.gb1, "Getbmp pic 0 0 750 500" 
 #demo.gb1, "Drawbmp pic 0 0" 
 #demo.gb1, "Segment segID" 
 #demo.gb1, "Flush" 
 #demo.gb1, "Delsegment ";segID - 1 
 End Sub 
 
 Function FontHeight(textFont$) 
 n = 1 
 While Val(Word$(textFont$, n)) = 0 
 n = n + 1 
 Wend 
 FontHeight = Val(Word$(textFont$, n)) 
 End Function 

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If the graphics window becomes obscured by another window or lies offscreen, DRAWBMP will not capture the full drawing. This can be prevented by using the stylebits WS_EX_TOPMOST prior to opening the window.