Programmatically create a UIView with color gradie

Question

I'm trying to generate a view with a gradient color background (A solid color to transparent) at runtime. Is there a way of doing that?

Answer 1

In Swift 3.1 I have added this extension to UIView

import Foundation
import UIKit
import CoreGraphics


extension UIView {
    func gradientOfView(withColours: UIColor...) {

        var cgColours = [CGColor]()

        for colour in withColours {
            cgColours.append(colour.cgColor)
        }
        let grad = CAGradientLayer()
        grad.frame = self.bounds
        grad.colors = cgColours
        self.layer.insertSublayer(grad, at: 0)
    }
}

which I then call with

    class OverviewVC: UIViewController {

        override func viewDidLoad() {
            super.viewDidLoad()

            self.view.gradientOfView(withColours: UIColor.red,UIColor.green, UIColor.blue)

        }
}

Answer 2

You can create a custom class GradientView:

Swift 4, Swift 3

class GradientView: UIView {
    override open class var layerClass: AnyClass {
       return CAGradientLayer.classForCoder()
    }

    required init?(coder aDecoder: NSCoder) {
        super.init(coder: aDecoder)
        let gradientLayer = layer as! CAGradientLayer
        gradientLayer.colors = [UIColor.white.cgColor, UIColor.black.cgColor]
    }
}

In the storyboard, set the class type to any view that you want to have gradient background:

This is better in the following ways:

• No need to set frame of CLayer
• Use NSConstraint as usual on the UIView
• Don't need to create sublayers (less memory use)

Answer 3

Swift 4:

Shows gradient in IB correctly:

@IBDesignable public class GradientView: UIView {

    override open class var layerClass: AnyClass {
        return CAGradientLayer.classForCoder()
    }

    required public init?(coder aDecoder: NSCoder) {
        super.init(coder: aDecoder)
        configureGradientLayer()
    }

    public override init(frame: CGRect) {
        super.init(frame: frame)
        configureGradientLayer()
    }

    func configureGradientLayer() {
        let gradientLayer = layer as! CAGradientLayer
        gradientLayer.colors = [UIColor(hex: 0x003399).cgColor, UIColor(hex: 0x00297b).cgColor]
    }
}

Answer 4

This is my recommended approach.

To promote reusability, I'd say create a category of CAGradientLayer and add your desired gradients as class methods. Specify them in the header file like this :

#import <QuartzCore/QuartzCore.h>

@interface CAGradientLayer (SJSGradients)

+ (CAGradientLayer *)redGradientLayer;
+ (CAGradientLayer *)blueGradientLayer;
+ (CAGradientLayer *)turquoiseGradientLayer;
+ (CAGradientLayer *)flavescentGradientLayer;
+ (CAGradientLayer *)whiteGradientLayer;
+ (CAGradientLayer *)chocolateGradientLayer;
+ (CAGradientLayer *)tangerineGradientLayer;
+ (CAGradientLayer *)pastelBlueGradientLayer;
+ (CAGradientLayer *)yellowGradientLayer;
+ (CAGradientLayer *)purpleGradientLayer;
+ (CAGradientLayer *)greenGradientLayer;

@end

Then in your implementation file, specify each gradient with this syntax :

+ (CAGradientLayer *)flavescentGradientLayer
{
    UIColor *topColor = [UIColor colorWithRed:1 green:0.92 blue:0.56 alpha:1];
    UIColor *bottomColor = [UIColor colorWithRed:0.18 green:0.18 blue:0.18 alpha:1];

    NSArray *gradientColors = [NSArray arrayWithObjects:(id)topColor.CGColor, (id)bottomColor.CGColor, nil];
    NSArray *gradientLocations = [NSArray arrayWithObjects:[NSNumber numberWithInt:0.0],[NSNumber numberWithInt:1.0], nil];

    CAGradientLayer *gradientLayer = [CAGradientLayer layer];
    gradientLayer.colors = gradientColors;
    gradientLayer.locations = gradientLocations;

    return gradientLayer;
}

Then simply import this category in your ViewController or any other required subclass, and use it like this :

CAGradientLayer *backgroundLayer = [CAGradientLayer purpleGradientLayer];
backgroundLayer.frame = self.view.frame;
[self.view.layer insertSublayer:backgroundLayer atIndex:0];

Answer 5

Swift Implementation:

var gradientLayerView: UIView = UIView(frame: CGRectMake(0, 0, view.bounds.width, 50))
var gradient: CAGradientLayer = CAGradientLayer()
gradient.frame = gradientLayerView.bounds
gradient.colors = [UIColor.grayColor().CGColor, UIColor.clearColor().CGColor]
gradientLayerView.layer.insertSublayer(gradient, atIndex: 0)
self.view.layer.insertSublayer(gradientLayerView.layer, atIndex: 0)

Answer 6

Simple swift view based on Yuchen's version

class GradientView: UIView {
    override class func layerClass() -> AnyClass { return CAGradientLayer.self }

    lazy var gradientLayer: CAGradientLayer = {
        return self.layer as! CAGradientLayer
    }()

    override init(frame: CGRect) {
        super.init(frame: frame)
    }

    required init?(coder aDecoder: NSCoder) {
        super.init(coder: aDecoder)
    }

}

Then you can use gradientLayer after initialization like this...

someView.gradientLayer.colors = [UIColor.whiteColor().CGColor, UIColor.blackColor().CGColor]