Density Image Converter Tool for Android, iOS, Windows and CSS

This is a powerful little tool that helps converting single or batches of images to Android, iOS, Windows and CSS specific formats and density versions given the source scale factor or target width/height in dp. It has a graphical and command line interface and supports a wide array of image types for reading and conversion including PNG, JPEG, SVG, PSD and Android 9-patches. Using sophisticated scaling algorithms, it is designed to make conversion of images easy and fast while keeping the image quality high (comparable to PS). To further optimize the output post processors like pngcrush and mozJpeg can be used (see section below).

Usage:

java -jar ./dconvert.jar -src "C:/your-folder/image-folder" -scale 4 

while

java -jar ./dconvert.jar 

will start the UI ( or double click the jar file).

To use the post processor ( pngcrush, mozJpeg and webp) the respective cmd tool must be set in PATH.

Download

Grab jar from latest release.

Requirements

• JDK 8

Usage

GUI

Start with

java -jar ./dconvert.jar 

provides the same features as the command line tool so see the help page of command line or tooltips. Additionally the UI will save its settings persistently making it easier for power users.

Command Line

E.g. with xxxhdpi (x4) source files:

java -jar ./dconvert.jar -src "C:/master-image/ic_my_icon.png" -scale 4 -platform android 

Will generate mdpi, hdpi, etc. folders in "C:/master-image/" containing the resized images

Full list of arguments:

-androidIncludeLdpiTvdpi

  Android only: creates mipmap sub-folders instead of drawable. -androidMipmapInsteadOfDrawable

 Android only: If set will include additional densities (ldpi and

tvdpi) -antiAliasing

 Anti-aliases images creating a little more blurred result; a light

3x3 convolve matrix is used; useful for very small images -clean

  Deletes all file and folders in out dir that would be used in

current configuration before converting. -compressionQuality <0.0-1.0>

Only used with compression 'jpg' sets the quality [0-1.0] where 1.0

is the highest quality. Default is 0.9 -dryRun

 Will not create any images or folder. Useful as fast preview in log

what images in what resolutions would be created. -dst <path>

The directory in which the converted files will be written. Will use

the source folder if this argument is omitted. -gui

 Starts graphical user interface -h,--help

  This help page -haltOnError

  If set will stop the process if an error occurred during conversion -iosCreateImagesetFolders

 iOS only: Will create .imageset folders and Content.json for every

source image n iOS converter. Default is just all images in the root

folder. -keepOriginalPostProcessedFiles

 If a post processor is run on a file, this flag will ensure that the

original will be kept (renamed _orig), otherwise only the optimized

image will be kept -outCompression <png|jpg|gif|bmp>
  Sets the compression of the converted images. Can be 'png', 'jpg',

'gif', 'bmp', 'png+jpg' or 'strict' which tries to use same

compression as source. By default will convert to png except if

source compression is jpeg. -platform <all|android|ios|win|web>
Can be 'all', 'android', 'ios', 'win' or 'web'. Sets what formats

the converted images will be generated for. E.g. set 'android' if

you only want to convert to android format. Default is [IOS,

ANDROID] -postProcessorMozJpeg

  Will post-process all jpegs with mozJpegs lossless compressor

'jpegtran'. Mozjpeg (specifically 'jpegtran') must be set in PATH,

tested with mozJpeg 3. Binaries for mozJpeg can be found on the

internet. -postProcessorPngCrush

 Will post-process all pngs with pngcrush, a lossless compressor. The

executable must be set in the system PATH as 'pngcrush' i.e

executable from every path. Pngcrush is a tool to compress pngs.

Requires v1.7.22+ -postProcessorWebp

  Will additionally convert all png/gif to lossless wepb and all jpg

to lossy webp with cwebp. Does not delete source files. The

executable must be set in the system path as 'cwebp' i.e executable

from every path. cwebp is the official converter from Google. -roundingMode <round|ceil|floor>

Defines the rounding mode when scaling the dimensions. Possible

options are 'round' (rounds up of >= 0.5), 'floor' (rounds down) and

'ceil' (rounds up). Default is ROUND_HALF_UP -scale <[float]|[int]dp>

  The source. Can be an image file or a folder containing image files

to be converted. This argument is mandatory. -scaleIsHeightDp

 If set and scale is in dp it will be interpreted as fixed height not

width -skipExisting

 If set will not overwrite a already existing file -skipUpscaling

If set will only scale down, but not up to prevent image quality

loss -src <path to file or folder>

The source scale. This can either be a factor (1,1.5,2,3,4,etc.)

used if the images already have the correct resolution for one scale

factor and up- and downscaling for all other densities are needed.

Ie. if you have the src file in density xxxhdpi you pass '4'. You

could also pass a value in dp (density independent pixels) which

denotes the output pixel width (or height if the flag is set) in

mdpi/x1. In this mode all output images will have the same width

(height). This argument is mandatory. -threads <1-8>

Sets the count of max parallel threads (more is faster but uses more

memory). Possible values are 1-8. Default is 4 -v,--version

  Gets current version -verbose

If set will log to console more verbose 

Using the .exe Launcher

Launch4J is used to create Windows executables. Two types are available: dconvert.exe and dconvert-gui.exe. The former is for command line, the later as a simple GUI starter. Launch4J will automatically download the required JRE.

Details

Scale Factor vs. Fixed DP Width/Height

There are 2 modes available for the user:

Scale Factor Mode

This mode is based on the idea that a developer gets the 'master' images in the highest needed resolution for his platform, e.g. xxxhdpi (x4) in Android. He then proceeds to generate every other density with it.

To better understand, here is a practical example for Android: Source file is ic_my_icon.png in density xxxhdpi with resolution 144x144 (this will be 36dp x 36dp). The tool will generate the following images in the following resolutions:

* mdpi 36x36 (x1) * hdpi 54x54 (x1.5) * xhdpi 72x72 (x2) * xxhdpi 108x108 (x3) * xxxhdpi 144x144 (x4) 

Fixed Width/Height in DP Mode

This mode is suitable if the source image is in an arbitrary resolution (but usually greater resolution than needed) and the needed density independent pixel (dp) dimensions are known to the developer. Either the width or height can be fixed with a dp value, while calculating the other dimension accordingly (keeping aspect ratio). In this mode all images will have the same pixel width (or height) for the same density bucket. Here is a practical example with fixed width:

You get an icon in 512x512 and want to display it in 48x48dp. The tool will generate the following resolutions:

* mdpi 48x48 (x1) * hdpi 72x72 (x1.5) * xhdpi 108x108 (x2) * xxhdpi 144x144 (x3) * xxxhdpi 192x192 (x4) 

Supported Platforms

This tool can convert to formats used in Android, iOS and Windows:

• Android: The Android converter will create drawable-ldpi, drawable-mdpi, etc. folders and saves images with the original name and respective scale factor in there. 9-Patches are specifically supported for Android - must have .9.png extension and only size correctly if out-compression is PNG.
• iOS: The iOS converter will either create a folder for each image with the .imageset postfix and 3 images in them with no, @2x and @3x postfix also including is the Content.json; or creates a single folder AssetCatalog with all the images in it.
• Windows: The Windows converter will create an Assets folder containing all the images with .scale-100, .scale-140 etc. postfixes. This should be compatible with Windows universal apps.
• Web: The web converter will create an img folder containing all the images with a 1x and a 2x scale factor which is compatible with the css image-set definition for multiple densities.

There are some options that might change the format of the output. See cmd help or tooltips for more info.

Supported File Types

This tool can read & write the following file types:

• PNG - read and write support (including 9-patches format)
• JPEG - read and write support with quality parameter
• GIF - read and write support (no animation support)
• SVG - can read svg, will compress with png per default
• PSD - can read some Photoshop files, will compress with png per default
• TIFF - read and write support
• BMP - read and write support

Details on the supported features of each format see here.

Out-compression has the following modes:

• as input (prefer png): jpegs will output jpeg, all other types png
• as input (strict): except PSD & SVG which will use png, every file will be compressed with the source compression
• [force compression]: jpeg, png, gif and bmp can be forced

If an image will be re-compressed with a file type that does not support alpha, alpha will be replaced with white (e.g. when converting png -> jpeg)

Quality Comparison

Note this will be available in future versions.

One of the main features of this converter is downscaling. Unfortunately without using specialized algorithms, down scaled images may look jagged or too blurred. I tested the algorithms of Thumbnailator and imgscalr which basically uses Chris Campbell's proposed progressive scaling algorithm. Upon further analysis Lanczos3 filtering seems to be recommended which produces results preserving more detail without being too jagged. The downside is, it is considerably slower than the former. This tool uses the implementation of Morten Nobel.

The tool provides 3 quality profiles:

• High Quality: uses Lanczos3 filtering (8 times slower than Balanced)
• Balanced: uses progressive bilinear algorithm for downscaling and bicubic filtering for upscaling (6 times slower than speed)
• Speed: uses nearest neighbor algorithm

In most cases Lanczos3 creates best results, although in some cases progressive bilinear scaling may be superior for very sharp edges of e.g. simple icons where the former creates some softness. Here are some example to see the difference yourself. The icons are down-scaled from 96x96 to 72x72 and 48x48, the photos from different source from 500 to 2000 px.

As reference, here are the results of other methods:

1. Thumbnailator with default settings ( progressive bilinear)
2. Photoshop CS5 with bicubic algorithm
3. imgscalr with ULTRA_QUALITY setting ( progressive bilinear)
4. simple Graphics2d with render hints VALUE_INTERPOLATION_BICUBIC, VALUE_RENDER_QUALITY, VALUE_ANTIALIAS_ON

Post Processors

The converter tool supports some post processors which run after the main conversation task to manipulate the resulting files. Post processors can be easily implemented by implementing the PostProcessor interface.

pngcrush

Pngcrush is a brute force png lossless compression tool. This may be already in your build chain (Android does this automatically), but may be useful if not. Will run pngcrush over the all converted *.png files. See code or output for specific used options.

The converter tool requires pngcrush to be in PATH. Minimal required version is 1.7.22; currently tested with v1.7.87 & 1.8.0. More info on the pngcrush wesbite

webp

WebP is an image format employing both lossy and lossless compression developed by Google. It is natively supported in Android and claims to be 25-35% smaller in file size than png and jpeg (in their respective categories).

If the flag is set the converter tool will compress jpegs to lossy webp and png/gif to lossless version of it. The program cwebp, which can be downloaded from Google's page, must be set in PATH variable.

More info on webp

mozJpeg

MozJpeg is a Jpeg encoder that also features some lossless compression techniques developed by the Mozilla foundation. It can be used to further shrink jpegs in size. Unfortunately they do not provide binaries on github, but they can be found e.g. here. The tool requires jpegtran to be set in PATH. Tested with mozJpeg 3.1

More info on mozJpeg

Implementation Details

Java 1.8, JavaFx and Apache CLI

For support of various image types TwelveMonkey lib is used which claims to have wider support of even basic file types (jpeg, etc.)

For parallel execution, every source file spawns his own thread for each platform converter e.g. 3 files 2 converters -> 6 threads needed.

The tool can easily be extended by using the IPlatformConvert and PostProcessor interfaces.

Both user interfaces use the same underlying logic.

Limitations & Known Issues

• You tell me

Possible Future Features

• change SVG source resolution to max needed resolution so no upscaling is needed

How to build

Build with maven

mvn clean package 

The .jar file will be in the generated /target folder

About

Credits

• TIFF, PSD, SVG image type support TwelveMonkeys
• HQ image resizing with Morten Nobel's Lib
• JavaFx theme based on Flatter by hendrikebbers
• Image file icon: Icon made by Freepik
• 9-patch resizing routine from Redwarp

License

Copyright 2016 Patrick Favre-Bulle

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at

http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0 

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations under the License.