Floating a Bitmap

[rliq]

Part of the application I am working on requires a 128x64 32Bit Bitmap to me moved smoothly across the top of my form. It may involve the Bitmap being rotated during the move.

I understand the maths etc for moving/rotating it. I want it to move smoothly and not flicker. There will be a tiled background image covering the area of the form over which the bitmap will be moved.

I'm just starting a seperate test project to experiment.

Has anyone had any experience with this before, maybe point out a nice technique they found or pitfall they avoided?

Thanks
Rob.

[rliq]

OK, I got this working already. I used the standard Timer control and each time it fired I used the number of DateTime Ticks passed since the previous time it fired, to determine how far to move the PictureBox containing the Bitmap. I tiled a background too and it worked just as well.

I do think though that it could be ultra-smooth, if I used a Bitmap directly and not a PictureBox container. However, I then have to be clever enough to know which parts of the form to Invalidate() each time I move the Bitmap. I know in C++ there were "Regions", I'm about to check if there are equivelents in .NET...

I'm aiming this App at .NET 4.0.

[Mutant_Fruit]

Use double buffering. That's the standard technique for this sort of flickering problem.

[rliq]

Jeez, don't you just hate it when somebody points out something you already knew but had forgotten!

Yep, made the form double buffered, used a Bitmap on it's own, used Regions to minimise invalidate() 'ions and now it is as 'smooth as!".... Australian term for "couldn't be smoother"

Thanks Mutant !!