xref: /frameworks/base/docs/html/guide/topics/graphics/index.jd

page.title=Graphics
@jd:body

<div id="qv-wrapper">
  <div id="qv">
  <h2>Topics</h2>
  <ol>
    <li><a href="{@docRoot}guide/topics/graphics/canvas.html">Canvas and Drawables</a></li>
    <li><a href="{@docRoot}guide/topics/graphics/hardware-accel.html">Hardware Acceleration</a></li>
    <li><a href="{@docRoot}guide/topics/graphics/opengl.html">OpenGL</a></li>
  </ol>
  </div>
</div>

<p>When writing an application, it's important to consider exactly what your graphical demands will be.
Varying graphical tasks are best accomplished with varying techniques. For example, graphics and animations
for a rather static application should be implemented much differently than graphics and animations
for an interactive game. Here, we'll discuss a few of the options you have for drawing graphics
on Android and which tasks they're best suited for.
</p>

<dl>
<dt><strong><a href="{@docRoot}guide/topics/graphics/2d-graphics.html">Canvas and
Drawables</a></strong></dt>
<dd>Android provides a set of {@link android.view.View} widgets that provide general functionality
for a wide array of user interfaces. You can also extend these widgets to modify the way they
look or behave. In addition, you can do your own custom 2D rendering using the various drawing
methods contained in the {@link android.graphics.Canvas} class or create {@link
android.graphics.drawable.Drawable} objects for things such as textured buttons or frame-by-frame
animations.</dd>

<dt><strong><a href="{@docRoot}guide/topics/graphics/hardware-accel.html">Hardware
Acceleration</a></strong></dt>
<dd>Beginning in Android 3.0, you can hardware accelerate the majority of
the drawing done by the Canvas APIs to further increase their performance.</dd>

<dt><strong><a href="{@docRoot}guide/topics/graphics/opengl.html">OpenGL</a></strong></dt>
<dd>Android supports OpenGL ES 1.0 and 2.0, with Android framework APIs as well as natively
with the Native Development Kit (NDK). Using the framework APIs is desireable when you want to add a
few graphical enhancements to your application that are not supported with the Canvas APIs, or if
you desire platform independence and don't demand high performance. There is a performance hit in
using the framework APIs compared to the NDK, so for many graphic intensive applications such as
games, using the NDK is beneficial (It is important to note though that you can still get adequate
performance using the framework APIs. For example, the Google Body app is developed entirely
using the framework APIs). OpenGL with the NDK is also useful if you have a lot of native
code that you want to port over to Android. For more information about using the NDK, read the
docs in the <code>docs/</code> directory of the <a href="{@docRoot}sdk/ndk/index.html">NDK
download.</a></dd>
</dl>