display an animation gif in WPF

Question

I would like to display an animation gif such as loading... in my XAML as my procedure is progressing. I found out that this cannot be easily done in WPF as I loaded my Gif and it just shows the first frame. What are the best ways to display an animation in WPF.

Answer 1

I had this issue, until I discovered that in WPF4, you can simulate your own keyframe image animations. First, split your animation into a series of images, title them something like "Image1.gif", "Image2,gif", and so on. Import those images into your solution resources. I'm assuming you put them in the default resource location for images.

You are going to use the Image control. Use the following XAML code. I've removed the non-essentials.

<Image Name="Image1">
   <Image.Triggers>
      <EventTrigger RoutedEvent="Image.Loaded"
         <EventTrigger.Actions>
            <BeginStoryboard>
               <Storyboard>
                   <ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames Duration="0:0:1" Storyboard.TargetProperty="Source" RepeatBehavior="Forever">
                      <DiscreteObjectKeyFrames KeyTime="0:0:0">
                         <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value>
                            <BitmapImage UriSource="Images/Image1.gif"/>
                         </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value>
                      </DiscreteObjectKeyFrames>
                     <DiscreteObjectKeyFrames KeyTime="0:0:0.25">
                        <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value>
                           <BitmapImage UriSource="Images/Image2.gif"/>
                        </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value>
                     </DiscreteObjectKeyFrames>
                     <DiscreteObjectKeyFrames KeyTime="0:0:0.5">
                        <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value>
                           <BitmapImage UriSource="Images/Image3.gif"/>
                        </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value>
                     </DiscreteObjectKeyFrames>
                     <DiscreteObjectKeyFrames KeyTime="0:0:0.75">
                        <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value>
                           <BitmapImage UriSource="Images/Image4.gif"/>
                        </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value>
                     </DiscreteObjectKeyFrames>
                     <DiscreteObjectKeyFrames KeyTime="0:0:1">
                        <DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value>
                           <BitmapImage UriSource="Images/Image5.gif"/>
                        </DiscreteObjectKeyFrame.Value>
                     </DiscreteObjectKeyFrames>
                  </ObjectAnimationUsingKeyFrames>
               </Storyboard>
            </BeginStoryboard>
         </EventTrigger.Actions>
      </EventTrigger>
   </Image.Triggers>
</Image>