How to figure out, If an imagefile (base64) has transparency?

Question

i wonder, how i could figure out if an image has a transparency effect applied. Is there any way in JavaScript or HTML5? I have a Base64-coded image. Is there a way to read out the transparency-information (alpha-channel). For example, if i load a PNG-Image, then convert it to base64, then drop it to html5-canvas, now how can i know if this has transparency-effect activated? thanx alot okyo

Answer 1

When you say 'drop it to html5-canvas', I assume you mean using an image element with the 'data:' URI scheme. Also, let's take it as given that you don't want to write javascript code to parse the image files.

You could do something like this pseudo-code:

create 2 off-screen canvases
color one opaque white and the other opaque black
draw the image on both of them
call getImageData on each canvas, using the image bounds
compare the image data

If the image has any transparent or partially-transparent pixels, then presumably the two canvases will end up at least a little different. One exception would be if the image has the transparency feature enabled but is entirely opaque anyway. Another would be if the non-opaque pixels are only very slightly transparent - not enough to alter a white or black background. But this technique would catch images where transparency is noticeable.