Icon background color and size.

[Shark]

How come when I extract an icon to a picture box and use the SavePicture method, the back ground of the file.ico is black and the image is smaller?

Picture box be transparent?

[Joacim Andersson]

You extract an icon from a file and paint it to a picturebox and then you save the bitmap by using SavePicture, right?
What you save is a BMP file and not the icon.

If you want to convert the bitmap you have painted on the picture box back to an icon then do the following:[*]Add an ImageList control to the Form[*]Set the MaskColor of the ImageList to the same as the BackColor of the PictureBox[*]When you have drawn the icon on the PictureBox add the image to the ImageList ListImages collection.[*]Clear the PictureBox[*]Use the ExtractIcon method of the ImageList ListImages collection to pull the image back from the ImageList to the PictureBox[*]Now you have an icon in the PictureBox save it with the SavePicture function

ImageList1.ListImages.Add , "Icon", Picture1.Image
Picture1.Cls
Picture1 = ImageList1.ListImages("Icon").ExtractIcon
ImageList1.ListImages.Clear
SavePicture Picture1, "c:\MyIcon.ico"

Good luck!

[Shark]

The background is still black. The picture lost its size and became distorted too.

[Joacim Andersson]

How do you extract the icon and how are you painting it to the picture box?

[Shark]

I got this somewhere on this site.

Option Explicit

Private Declare Function ExtractIcon Lib "shell32.dll" Alias "ExtractIconA" (ByVal hInst As Long, ByVal lpszExeFileName As String, ByVal nIconIndex As Long) As Long
Private Declare Function DrawIcon Lib "user32" (ByVal hdc As Long, ByVal x As Long, ByVal y As Long, ByVal hIcon As Long) As Long

Private Sub Form_Load()
    'Set initial settings
    Picture1.AutoRedraw = True
    Me.ScaleMode = vbPixels
End Sub

Private Sub Command1_Click()
    Dim hIcon As Long
    'Extract the icon from Calculator
    hIcon = ExtractIcon(App.hInstance, "C:\myproject.exe", 0)
    
    'Draw the Icon on to Picture1
    DrawIcon Picture1.hdc, 0, 0, hIcon
    Picture1.Picture = Picture1.Image
    
    'Convert the Bitmap to an Icon
    ImageList1.ListImages.Add , , Picture1.Picture
    Picture1.Cls
    Set Picture1.Picture = Nothing
    Set Picture1.Picture = ImageList1.ListImages(1).ExtractIcon
    'Save the Icon
    SavePicture Picture1.Picture, App.Path & "\MyIco.ico"
End Sub

Thanks Joacim for always helping.

[Joacim Andersson]

Make sure the picture box is 32x32 pixels in size (or 36x36 if it has a border).

[Shark]

That did the trick for some icons. There are others that are smaller so I have to change the imagelist size.

Thanks.

I think I have to play around with the size in the imagelist.

[Joacim Andersson]

Well, ExtractIcon always extracts the 32x32 icon.
If you want to extract icons in the size of 16x16 use ExtractIconEx instead.