I have a project and I’m curious what the community would recommend as the best approach to implementing it.
Process:
On an android device allow the user to assemble an image composite that includes a background, some clip art (positioned and/or rotated/sized by the user), maybe a photo, and some text.
do some stuff…
print the image on the server.
The only mandatory requirement is that the server HAS to be a PC Laptop machine, though I can replace Windows with linux, if I need to (don’t ask).
Should I go down the road of attempting to construct a finished JPG right on the Android device and delivering that to the server for printing? If so, what Java image library is best for such a task?
Or should I try to implement imagemagik on the server (is that even possible if I kept the Windows that’s pre-installed on it?) or some other image automation?
I could build this as an Adobe AIR app and run it on Android, but am worried about the 100% portability of Air onto Android and don’t have the time to get stuck 1/2 way into something that involved only to have to start from scratch with a totally different approach.
All ideas welcome.
Well Android actually comes with a Jpeg codec installed and a png codec. As for the UI work to overlay the images into the correct locations that’s up to you. But to construct the final version of the image, you can simply grab your main raster (android.graphics.Bitmap) and use Bitmap.CompressFormat (JPG or PNG) to save it to a stream somewhere. Then the file can be sent to the server. I mean if the raster is relatively small (which I assume it is or else you wouldn’t really be able to provide a simple UI for them to composite the image) this will work.
Hope this helps.