renderizer

Renderizer is a Titanium build plugin which can automate rendering of image resources at different resolutions for different platforms. It reads in a YAML config file which specifies output directories, DPIs, and lists of images to render.

Included is a simple applescript for automating Adobe Illustrator. Renderizer is capable of using either Inkscape or Illustrator as the render backend.

Renderizer will look for an images.yaml file in your project directory (ie, next to the Resources and plugins folders). It looks like this:

icons:
   backend: illustrator

   output:
      - path: Resources/images/ipod
        dpi: 72

      - path: Resources/images/ipod
        dpi: 144
        append: '@2x'

      - path: Resources/images/ipad
        dpi: 82

      - path: Resources/images/android
        prepend: 'ic_'
        dpi: 82

   images:
      - icons/foo.ai
      - icons/bar.ai
      - icons/baz.ai
      - icons/foo[0-9].ai
      - more_icons/*.ai

androidui:
   backend: illustrator
   platform: android

   output:
      - path: Resources/images/android
        dpi: 90

   images:
      - navbar.ai
      - background.ai

appicons:
   backend: inkscape
   platform: ios        # these images won't be put down on android

   output:
      - path: Resources/iphone
        dpi: 72

      - path: Resources/iphone
        dpi: 144
        append: '@2x'

      - path: Resources/iphone
        dpi: 91
        append: '-72'

      - path: Resources/iphone
        dpi: 36
        append: '-Small'

      - path: Resources/iphone
        dpi: 73
        append: '-Small@2x'

      - path: Resources/iphone
        dpi: 63
        append: '-Small-50'

      - path: Resources/iphone
        dpi: 647
        rename: iTunesArtwork

   images:
      - Icon.svg

icons and androidui are arbitrary group names. Any top level property in the YAML file is assumed to be a group name. Images are rendered to png files and are placed in the path specified.

The prepend and append properties can be used to prepend or append text to the filename. The rename property will force each image to be renamed to the name specified, so it's really only useful if you're rendering a single image.

Images are assumed to be in an images directory in your project directory. You can use wildcards (as well as other special characters supported by Python's glob module) to specify groups of images under a path.

Since Illustrator accepts a 'scaling' property for rendering and not a DPI, it is assumed your files were created with a DPI of 72. If they weren't, use the 'srcdpi' to specify the source dpi.

If you create images/Icon.svg at 57x57 points in inkscape, the above group called appicons will render all of the icons needed by Apple for app submission.

For more information on DPIs see the wiki.

To install the plugin, make a plugins directory in your project directory. CD into it, then:

git clone git@github.com:russfrank/renderizer.git

Then, add to your <plugins> section in your tiapp.xml:

<plugins>
   <plugin version="0.0">renderizer</plugin>
</plugins>

Now, your images will be rendered whenever you build your project. Images are only re-rendered when their modification date has changed. So, touch an image source if you need it re-rendered.

Images are only dropped down if the Titanium properties specified in the group / output rule match. So, if you specify that a group is ios only, it will only be put down for ios builds. Images are rendered into build/images and then symlinked into the destination directory.

Renderizer requires PyYAML, so if you don't already have this installed you'll have to install it:

easy_install PyYaml

You can also run the rendering process manually by running the plugin.py from your project directory:

python plugins/renderizer/plugin.py

Plugin plugins & 9patch

I recently added support for plugins within the plugin. These have hooks for before each render and after each render. This way, you can make some custom modifications to images before or after rendering.

If you'd like to write your own plugins I've included an example_plugin.py file which should get you started. They're just python classes with a couple of methods.

Included is a 9patch plugin (9patch.py). To use it, you must be using the inkscape backend. Make an svg with a layer called 9patch. Then, draw the 9patch lines on the sides of the image with large black rectangles on this 9patch layer. Should look something like this

Then, with an images.yaml like this

android_default_9patch_portrait:
  backend: inkscape
  plugins: [9patch]

  output:

    - path: platform/android/res/drawable-normal-port-mdpi/
      dpi: 40
      rename: 'background.9.png'

    - path: platform/android/res/drawable-normal-port-hdpi/
      dpi: 72
      rename: 'background.9.png'

    - path: platform/android/res/drawable-normal-port-xhdpi/
      dpi: 120
      rename: 'background.9.png'

    - path: platform/android/res/drawable-xlarge-port-mdpi/
      dpi: 120
      rename: 'background.9.png'

    - path: platform/android/res/drawable-large-port-mdpi/
      dpi: 70
      rename: 'background.9.png'

  images:
    - android/Default-portrait.9.svg

you'll get 9patched images for each dpi specified.

This plugin actually renders just the 9patch lines to a temporary png file. Then, it examines the border and draws black areas of the 9patch temporary png to your rendered png. The result is that you can render for multiple resolutions and have 9patch images for every resolution.

License

MIT.