UIImage created from CGImageRef fails with UIImagePNGRepresentation

Question

I'm using the following code to crop and create a new UIImage out of a bigger one. I've isolated the issue to be with the function CGImageCreateWithImageInRect() which seem to not set some CGImage property the way I want. :-) The problem is that a call to function UIImagePNGRepresentation() fails returning a nil.

CGImageRef origRef = [stillView.image CGImage];
CGImageRef cgCrop = CGImageCreateWithImageInRect( origRef, theRect);
UIImage *imgCrop = [UIImage imageWithCGImage:cgCrop];

...

NSData *data = UIImagePNGRepresentation ( imgCrop);

-- libpng error: No IDATs written into file

Any idea what might wrong or alternative for cropping a rect out of UIImage?

Answer 1

I had the same problem, but only when testing compatibility on iOS 3.2. On 4.2 it works fine.

In the end I found this http://www.hive05.com/2008/11/crop-an-image-using-the-iphone-sdk/ which works on both, albeit a little more verbose!

I converted this into a category on UIImage:

UIImage+Crop.h

@interface UIImage (Crop)
- (UIImage*) imageByCroppingToRect:(CGRect)rect;
@end

UIImage+Crop.m

@implementation UIImage (Crop)

- (UIImage*) imageByCroppingToRect:(CGRect)rect
{
    //create a context to do our clipping in
    UIGraphicsBeginImageContext(rect.size);
    CGContextRef currentContext = UIGraphicsGetCurrentContext();

    //create a rect with the size we want to crop the image to
    //the X and Y here are zero so we start at the beginning of our
    //newly created context
    CGRect clippedRect = CGRectMake(0, 0, rect.size.width, rect.size.height);
    CGContextClipToRect( currentContext, clippedRect);

    //create a rect equivalent to the full size of the image
    //offset the rect by the X and Y we want to start the crop
    //from in order to cut off anything before them
    CGRect drawRect = CGRectMake(rect.origin.x * -1,
                                 rect.origin.y * -1,
                                 self.size.width,
                                 self.size.height);

    //draw the image to our clipped context using our offset rect
    CGContextTranslateCTM(currentContext, 0.0, rect.size.height);
    CGContextScaleCTM(currentContext, 1.0, -1.0);
    CGContextDrawImage(currentContext, drawRect, self.CGImage);

    //pull the image from our cropped context
    UIImage *cropped = UIGraphicsGetImageFromCurrentImageContext();

    //pop the context to get back to the default
    UIGraphicsEndImageContext();

    //Note: this is autoreleased
    return cropped;
}


@end

Answer 2

In a PNG there are various chunks present, some containing palette info, some actual image data and some other information, it's a very interesting standard. The IDAT chunk is the bit that actually contains the image data. If there's no "IDAT written into file" then libpng has had some issue creating a PNG from the input data.

I don't know exactly what your stillView.image is, but what happens when you pass your code a CGImageRef that is certainly valid? What are the actual values in theRect? If your theRect is beyond the bounds of the image then the cgCrop you're trying to use to make the UIImage could easily be nil - or not nil, but containing no image or an image with width and height 0, giving libpng nothing to work with.