GDI+ is next evolution of GDI. Using GDI objects in earlier versions of Visual Studio was a pain.

In
Visual Studio .NET, Microsoft has taken care of most of the GDI problems and have made it easy to
use.

GDI+ resides in System.Drawing.dll assembly. All GDI+ classes are reside in the System.Drawing,
System.Text, System.Printing, System.Internal , System.Imaging, System.Drawing2D and
System.Design namespaces.

The first class we must discuss is the Graphics class. After the Graphics class, I will discuss other
useful GDI+ classes and structures such as Pen, Brush, and Rectangle. The final part of this tutorial
are some examples in C#.

The Graphics Class.

The Graphics class encapsulates GDI+ drawing surfaces. Before drawing any object ( for example
circle, or rectangle ) we have to create a surface using Graphics class. Generally we use Paint event of
a Form to get the reference of the graphics. Another way is to override OnPaint method.

Here is how you get a reference of the Graphics object:

Private Sub form1_Paint(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As PaintEventArgs)

Dim g As Graphics = e.Graphics
End Sub 'form1_Paint

OR:

Protected Overrides Sub OnPaint(ByVal e As PaintEventArgs)

Dim g As Graphics = pe.Graphics
End Sub 'OnPaint

Once you have the Graphics reference, you can call any of this class's members to draw various
objects. Here are some of Graphics class's methods:

DrawArc Draws an arc from the specified ellipse

DrawBezier Draws a cubic bezier curve
DrawBeziers Draws a series of cubic Bezier curves
DrawClosedCurve Draws a closed curve defined by an array of points
DrawCurve Draws a curve defined by an array of points
DrawEllipse Draws an ellipse
DrawImage Draws an image
DrawLine Draws a line
DrawPath Draws the line curves defined by a GraphicsPath
DrawPie Draws the outline of a pie section
DrawPolygon Draws the outline of a polygon
DrawRectangle Draws the outline of a rectangle
DrawString Draws a string
FillEllipse Fills the interior of an ellipse defined by a bounding rectangle
FillPath Fills the interior of a path
FillPie Fills the interior of a pie section
FillPolygon Fills the interior of a polygon defined by an array of points
FillRectangle Fills the interior of a rectangle with a Brush
FillRectangles Fills the interior of aseries of rectangles with a Brush
FillRegion Fills the interior of a Region

In .NET, GDI+ functionality resides in the System.Drawing.dll. Before you start using GDI+ classes,
you must add reference to the System.Drawing.dll and import System.Drawing namespace. If you are
using Visual Studio .NET for your development, you can add reference to the GDI+ library using
following:

Creating this project is simple. Create a Windows application and add reference to the
System.Drawing.dll using Project->Add Reference menu item. See Figure 1.

Figure 1. Adding reference to System.Drawing.dll

After that add these two lines.

Imports System.Drawing
Imports System.Drawing.Drawing2D

Note: If you create a Windows application using VS.NET, you only need write only one line.

Imports System.Drawing.Drawing2D

After that add a Form_Paint event handler using the Properties Window. See Figure 2.
Figure 2. Adding Form_Paint event handler.

Note: You can also add Form paint event handler manually described above.

Graphics Objects

After creating a Graphics object, you can use it draw lines, fill shapes, draw text and so on. The major
objects are:

Brush Used to fill enclosed surfaces with patterns,colors, or bitmaps

Pen Used to draw lines and polygons, including rectangles, arcs, and pies
Font Used to describe the font to be used to render text
Color Used to describe the color used to render a particular object. In GDI+ color can be alpha blended

The Pen Class

A pen draws a line of specified width and style. You always use Pen constructor to create a pen. The
constructor initializes a new instance of the Pen class. You can initialize it with a color or brush.

Initializes a new instance of the Pen class with the specified color.

public Sub Pen(Color)

Initializes a new instance of the Pen class with the specified Brush.

public Sub Pen(Brush)

Initializes a new instance of the Pen class with the specified Brush and width.
public Sub Pen(Brush, float)

Initializes a new instance of the Pen class with the specified Color and Width.

public Sub Pen(Color, float)

Here is one example:

Dim pn As New Pen(Color.Blue) or Dim pn As New Pen( Color.Blue, 100 )

Some of its most commonly used properties are:

Alignment Gets or sets the alignment for objects drawn with this Pen
Brush Gets or sets the Brush that determines attributes of this Pen
Color Gets or sets the color of this Pen
Width Gets or sets the width of this Pen

The Color Structure

A Color structure represents an ARGB color. Here are ARGB properties of it:

A Gets the alpha component value for this Color

B Gets the blue component value for this Color
G Gets the green component value for this Color
R Gets the red component value for this Color

You can call the Color members. Each color name ( say Blue ) is a member of the Color structure. Here
is how to use a Color structure:

Dim pn As New Pen( Color.Blue )

The Font Class

The Font class defines a particular format for text such as font type, size, and style attributes. You use
font constructor to create a font.

Initializes a new instance of the Font class with the specified attributes.

public Sub Font(string, float)

Initializes a new instance of the Font class from the specified existing Font and FontStyle.

public Sub Font(Font, FontStyle)

Where FontStyle is an enumeration and here are its members:

Member Name Description

Bold Bold text
Italic Italic text
Regular Normal text
Strikeout Text with a line through the middle
Underline Underlined text

Here is one example:

Graphics g ;
Dim font As New Font("Times New Roman", 26)

Some of its most commonly used properties are:

Bold Gets a value indicating whether this Font is bold

FontFamily Gets the FontFamily of this Font
Height Gets the height of this Font
Italic Gets a value indicating whether this Font is Italic
Name Gets the face name of this Font
Size Gets the size of this Font
SizeInPoints Gets the size, in points, of this Font
Strikeout Gets a value indicating whether this Font is strikeout (has a line through it)
Style Gets style information for this Font
Underline Gets a value indicating whether this Font is underlined
Unit Gets the unit of measure for this Font

The Brush Class

The Brush class is an abstract base class and cannot be instantiated. We always use its derived
classes to instantiate a brush object, such as SolidBrush, TextureBrush, RectangleGradientBrush, and
LinearGradientBrush.

Here is one example:

Dim lBrush As New LinearGradientBrush(rect, Color.Red, Color.Yellow,

LinearGradientMode.BackwardDiagonal)

OR

Dim brsh As New SolidBrush(Color.Red), 40, 40, 140, 140)

The SolidBrush class defines a brush made up of a single color. Brushes are used to fill graphics
shapes such as rectangles, ellipses, pies, polygons, and paths.

The TextureBrush encapsulates a Brush that uses an fills the interior of a shape with an image.

The LinearGradiantBrush encapsulates both two-color gradients and custom multi-color gradients.

The Rectangle Structure

public Sub Rectangle(Point, Size) or public Sub Rectangle(int, int, int, int)

The Rectangle structure is used to draw a rectangle on WinForms. Besides its constructor, the
Rectangle structure has following members:

Bottom Gets the y-coordinate of the lower-right corner of the rectangular region defined by this Rectangle
Height Gets or sets the width of the rectangular region defined by this Rectangle
IsEmpty Tests whether this Rectangle has a Width or a Height of 0
Left Gets the x-coordinate of the upper-left corner of the rectangular region defined by this Rectangle
Location Gets or sets the coordinates of the upper-left corner of the rectangular region represented by this Rectangle
Right Gets the x-coordinate of the lower-right corner of the rectangular region defined by this Rectangle
Size Gets or sets the size of this Rectangle
Top Gets the y-coordinate of the upper-left corner of the rectangular region defined by this Rectangle
Width Gets or sets the width of the rectangular region defined by this Rectangle
X Gets or sets the x-coordinate of the upper-left corner of the rectangular region defined by this Rectangle
Y Gets or sets the y-coordinate of the upper-left corner of the rectangular region defined by this Rectangle

Its constructor initializes a new instance of the Rectangle class. Here is the definition:

public Rectangle(Point, Size); or public Rectangle(int, int, int, int);

The Point Structure

This structure is similar to the POINT structure in C++. It represents an ordered pair of x and y
coordinates that define a point in a two-dimensional plane. The member x represents the x coordinates
and y represents the y coordinates of the plane.

Here is how to instantiate a point structure:

Dim pt1 As New Point(30, 30)

Dim pt2 As New Point(110, 100)

Some sample Examples:

Drawing a rectangle

You can override OnPaint event of your form to draw an rectangle. The LinearGradientBrush
encapsulates a brush and linear gradient.

Protected Overrides Sub OnPaint(ByVal pe As PaintEventArgs)

Dim g As Graphics = pe.Graphics
Dim rect As New Rectangle(50, 30, 100, 100)
Dim lBrush As New LinearGradientBrush(rect, Color.Red, Color.Yellow,
LinearGradientMode.BackwardDiagonal)
g.FillRectangle(lBrush, rect)
End Sub 'OnPaint

The output of the above code looks like Figure 3.

Figure 3. Drawing a rectangle.

Drawing an Arc

DrawArc function draws an arc. This function takes four arguments.

First is the Pen. You create a pen by using the Pen class. The Pen constructor takes at least one
argument, the color or the brush of the pen. Second argument width of the pen or brush is optional.

Dim pn As New Pen( Color.Blue ) or Dim pn As New Pen( Color.Blue, 100 )

The second argument is a rectangle. You can create a rectangle by using Rectangle structure. The
Rectangle constructor takes four int type arguments and they are left and right corners of the
rectangle.

Dim rect As New Rectangle(50, 50, 200, 100)

Protected Overrides Sub OnPaint(ByVal pe As PaintEventArgs)
Dim g As Graphics = pe.Graphics
Dim pn As New Pen(Color.Blue)
Dim rect As New Rectangle(50, 50, 200, 100)
g.DrawArc(pn, rect, 12, 84)
End Sub 'OnPaint

The output looks like this:

Drawing a Line

DrawLine function of the Graphics class draws a line. It takes three parameters, a pen, and two Point
class parameters, starting and ending points. Point class constructor takes x, y arguments.

Protected Overrides Sub OnPaint(ByVal pe As PaintEventArgs)

Dim g As Graphics = pe.Graphics
Dim pn As New Pen(Color.Blue)
' Rectangle rect = new Rectangle(50, 50, 200, 100);
Dim pt1 As New Point(30, 30)
Dim pt2 As New Point(110, 100)
g.DrawLine(pn, pt1, pt2)
End Sub 'OnPaint

The output looks like this:

Drawing an Ellipse
An ellipse( or a circle) can be drawn by using DrawEllipse method. This method takes only two
parameters, Pen and rectangle.

Protected Overrides Sub OnPaint(ByVal pe As PaintEventArgs)

Dim g As Graphics = pe.Graphics
Dim pn As New Pen(Color.Blue, 100)
Dim rect As New Rectangle(50, 50, 200, 100)
g.DrawEllipse(pn, rect)
End Sub 'OnPaint

The output looks like this:

The FillPath

Drawing bazier curves is little more complex than other objects.

Protected Overrides Sub OnPaint(ByVal pe As PaintEventArgs)

Dim g As Graphics = pe.Graphics
g.FillRectangle(New SolidBrush(Color.White), ClientRectangle)
Dim path As New GraphicsPath(New Point() {New Point(40, 140), New Point(275, 200), New
Point(105, 225), New Point(190, 300), New Point(50, 350), New Point(20, 180)}, New Byte()
{CByte(PathPointType.Start), CByte(PathPointType.Bezier), CByte(PathPointType.Bezier),
CByte(PathPointType.Bezier), CByte(PathPointType.Line), CByte(PathPointType.Line)})
Dim pgb As New PathGradientBrush(path)
pgb.SurroundColors = New Color() {Color.Green, Color.Yellow, Color.Red, Color.Blue, Color.Orange,
Color.White}
g.FillPath(pgb, path)
End Sub 'OnPaint

The output looks like this:

Drawing Text and Strings

You can override OnPaint event of your form to draw an rectangle. The LinearGradientBrush
encapsulates a brush and linear gradient.

Protected Overrides Sub OnPaint(ByVal pe As PaintEventArgs)

Dim fnt As New Font("Verdana", 16)
Dim g As Graphics = pe.Graphics
g.DrawString("GDI+ World", fnt, New SolidBrush(Color.Red), 14, 10)
End Sub 'OnPaint

The output looks like this: