setting QPixmap's alpha channel

Does there exist a better way to do it than this?

Code:

---

void setAlphaChannel(QPixmap& pixmap, int const alpha)
{
  QImage image(pixmap.toImage().convertToFormat(QImage::Format_ARGB32));
 
  for (int x(0); x != image.width(); ++x)
  {
    for (int y(0); y != image.height(); ++y)
    {
      QColor color(image.pixel(x,y));
 
      color.setAlpha(alpha);
 
      image.setPixel(x, y, color.rgba());
    }
  }
 
  pixmap = QPixmap::fromImage(image);
}

---

I've read about the now-obsolete QPixmap method called setAlphaChannel(), but it's implementations are platform-dependent.

These are fairly equal (350ms over 1000 conversions) on my machine:

Code:

---

QPixmap input("Lenna.png");
 
QImage image(input.size(), QImage::Format_ARGB32_Premultiplied);
image.fill(Qt::transparent);
QPainter p(&image);
p.setOpacity(0.2);
p.drawPixmap(0, 0, input);
p.end();
 
QPixmap output = QPixmap::fromImage(image);
 
// or
 
QPixmap output(input.size());
outut.fill(Qt::transparent);
QPainter p(&output);
p.setOpacity(0.2);
p.drawPixmap(0, 0, input);
p.end();

---

Your code comes in at around 8850 ms for the same 1000 conversions.

Did you try method #1 without the fill? Perhaps this would work?

Code:

---

QImage image(pixmap.size(), QImage::Format_ARGB32_Premultiplied);
 
{
  QPainter painter(&image);
 
  painter.setCompositionMode(QPainter::CompositionMode_Source);
 
  painter.setOpacity(.2);
  painter.drawPixmap(0, 0, pixmap);
}
 
pixmap = QPixmap::fromImage(image);

---

I did the pixmap version first: without the fill I was not getting an alpha channel in the PNG I saved from the pixmap version. I just left it in the image version, but it seems to work fine without and is faster still.

I've found an example by Nokia, it is even more complicated :)

http://www.developer.nokia.com/Commu...Pixmap_picture

What puzzles me is the fill(Qt::transparent). Why is the fill() needed, if the entire transparent QPixmap or QImage is filled and the CompositionMode is QPainter::CompositionMode_Source?