I am building up a view with various text and image elements.
I want to display some text in the view with a blurry copy of the text behind it, but not just a text shadow.
How do I apply Gaussian blurred text onto a UIImage or layer?
I am building up a view with various text and image elements.
I want to display some text in the view with a blurry copy of the text behind it, but not just a text shadow.
How do I apply Gaussian blurred text onto a UIImage or layer?
Take a look at Apple's GLImageProcessing iPhone sample. It does some blurring, among other things.
The relevant code includes:
static void blur(V2fT2f *quad, float t) // t = 1
{
GLint tex;
V2fT2f tmpquad[4];
float offw = t / Input.wide;
float offh = t / Input.high;
int i;
glGetIntegerv(GL_TEXTURE_BINDING_2D, &tex);
// Three pass small blur, using rotated pattern to sample 17 texels:
//
// .\/..
// ./\\/
// \/X/\ rotated samples filter across texel corners
// /\\/.
// ../\.
// Pass one: center nearest sample
glVertexPointer (2, GL_FLOAT, sizeof(V2fT2f), &quad[0].x);
glTexCoordPointer(2, GL_FLOAT, sizeof(V2fT2f), &quad[0].s);
glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_TEXTURE_ENV_MODE, GL_MODULATE);
glColor4f(1.0/5, 1.0/5, 1.0/5, 1.0);
validateTexEnv();
glDrawArrays(GL_TRIANGLE_STRIP, 0, 4);
// Pass two: accumulate two rotated linear samples
glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MIN_FILTER, GL_LINEAR);
glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MAG_FILTER, GL_LINEAR);
glEnable(GL_BLEND);
glBlendFunc(GL_SRC_ALPHA, GL_ONE);
for (i = 0; i < 4; i++)
{
tmpquad[i].x = quad[i].s + 1.5 * offw;
tmpquad[i].y = quad[i].t + 0.5 * offh;
tmpquad[i].s = quad[i].s - 1.5 * offw;
tmpquad[i].t = quad[i].t - 0.5 * offh;
}
glTexCoordPointer(2, GL_FLOAT, sizeof(V2fT2f), &tmpquad[0].x);
glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_TEXTURE_ENV_MODE, GL_REPLACE);
glActiveTexture(GL_TEXTURE1);
glEnable(GL_TEXTURE_2D);
glClientActiveTexture(GL_TEXTURE1);
glTexCoordPointer(2, GL_FLOAT, sizeof(V2fT2f), &tmpquad[0].s);
glEnableClientState(GL_TEXTURE_COORD_ARRAY);
glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_2D, tex);
glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_TEXTURE_ENV_MODE, GL_COMBINE);
glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_COMBINE_RGB, GL_INTERPOLATE);
glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_SRC0_RGB, GL_TEXTURE);
glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_SRC1_RGB, GL_PREVIOUS);
glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_SRC2_RGB, GL_PRIMARY_COLOR);
glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_OPERAND2_RGB, GL_SRC_COLOR);
glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_COMBINE_ALPHA, GL_REPLACE);
glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_SRC0_ALPHA, GL_PRIMARY_COLOR);
glColor4f(0.5, 0.5, 0.5, 2.0/5);
validateTexEnv();
glDrawArrays(GL_TRIANGLE_STRIP, 0, 4);
// Pass three: accumulate two rotated linear samples
for (i = 0; i < 4; i++)
{
tmpquad[i].x = quad[i].s - 0.5 * offw;
tmpquad[i].y = quad[i].t + 1.5 * offh;
tmpquad[i].s = quad[i].s + 0.5 * offw;
tmpquad[i].t = quad[i].t - 1.5 * offh;
}
glDrawArrays(GL_TRIANGLE_STRIP, 0, 4);
// Restore state
glDisableClientState(GL_TEXTURE_COORD_ARRAY);
glClientActiveTexture(GL_TEXTURE0);
glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_2D, Half.texID);
glDisable(GL_TEXTURE_2D);
glTexEnvi(GL_TEXTURE_ENV, GL_OPERAND2_RGB, GL_SRC_ALPHA);
glActiveTexture(GL_TEXTURE0);
glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MIN_FILTER, GL_NEAREST);
glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MAG_FILTER, GL_NEAREST);
glDisable(GL_BLEND);
}
iPhone OS doesn't provide any Core Image filters that I know of - otherwise, yes, a filtered CALayer would be the right way to do it. If NSBitmapImageRep were available, you could do a primitive blur by drawing the text to it, shrinking the image (downsampling), then enlarging the image again (upsampling) - unfortunately it seems to be missing as well. I've seen blurred text accomplished in Flash, which (last I checked) doesn't have pixel-level filtering; you might try looking for a tutorial on that and seeing what you can adapt to Cocoa Touch.
On the desktop, no question, you'd use CoreImage to do this.
On the phone though, I don't think there exists a way to do this using CoreGraphics. If it is absolutely critical OpenGLES may be able to help.
However, I would suggest rethinking your interface. I would think the blurred text would be distracting.
Edit: mledford points out in the comments that you could use CoreAnimation. I don't know if CA on the phone includes blur radius like on the desktop, but you could try it.
You will take a performance hit if you use alpha layers. Consider a different approach if possible (maybe even precompositing the text and flattening it into a graphic instead of multiple layers).
Try it, and use Instruments to check out the performance and see if it's acceptable. If you're doing it in a scrolling view, your scrolling will bog down a lot.