Hour 5. Drawing Graphical Images

We've all heard that a picture is worth a thousand words, and when it comes to computer games, they might be worth even more than that. Or to translate into nerd talk, a 640x480 image is worth 307,200 pixels. Okay, maybe nerd talk is something I should avoid. The point is that pictures (images) are extremely important in computer games because they provide the only means of incorporating artwork into the games. Sure, it's nice to be able to draw lines, rectangles, and ellipses using GDI functions, but it would take a great deal of effort to draw a menacing creature out of graphics primitives. For that reason, we use graphical images as a means of visualizing graphical parts of games . This hour is all about showing you how to load and display graphical images.

In this hour, you'll learn:

The fundamentals of bitmap images and why they are important in game programming
About the inner workings of bitmap images
How to develop an all-purpose bitmap class for use in games
How to use the bitmap class to represent slide images in a slideshow program