Single-Page Images

The central element in ImageGear API is the single-page image handle: HIGEAR. The majority of ImageGear API functions take HIGEAR as a parameter. HIGEAR encapsulates the following data:

DIB information, such as dimensions, color space, and channel depths. See DIB Information for more details.
Image pixels (if HIGEAR contains a raster image). Usually, you do not need to access the image pixels directly. You can load, display, process, save images, and do other operations using high-level API that accesses image pixels internally. If you need to access image pixels directly, see Accessing Image Pixels for details.
Vector data (if HIGEAR contains a vector image). See Working with Vector Images for details.
Image display attributes. See Displaying Images for details.
Image orientation. See Image Orientation for details.
Color profile (optional). See Using Color Profile Manager for details.
Non-rectangular Area of Interest (optional). See Region of Interest Processing for details.
Format-specific information (for DICOM and FlashPix).
Extra channel information (optional). See Spot and Mask Channels for details.

Usually you create a HIGEAR handle by loading an image from a disk file, or from memory. See Loading Images for details. You can also create a new HIGEAR handle using IG_image_create, or import a Windows DIB into HIGEAR using IG_image_DIB_import.

When HIGEAR is no longer used, you must delete it using IG_image_delete.

A HIGEAR can contain raster data or vector data, but not both (except for the case when vector data contains raster entities; however, such raster data is only accessible via the vector API). Vector images are further subdivided into CAD, PDF, and XPS. Use IG_image_is_raster, IG_image_is_vector, IG_image_is_CAD, IG_image_is_PDF, and IG_image_is_XPS to find out the type of image represented by a HIGEAR.

See Also