Converting Images to Base64 and Back Again

[mbutler755]

Ever need to store a picture in a database? It's not the easiest thing to do, but this class I wrote makes it pretty quick and easy.

The attached project consists of a VB.NET class that does all the hard work for you. With this class you can:

1) Convert an image to a Base64 object
2) Convert a Base64 object back to an image
3) Convert an array of bytes to an image
4) Convert an image to an array of bytes

It works quickly and you will be able to save images as strings in your database. A string is a much easier thing to save than an image IMO.

I also built out a quick sample project so you can see how the class works and how you can use it.

Here's the code of my class:

Imports System.IO
Imports System.Drawing
 
''' <summary>
''' ImageToByteArray - Takes in an image and converts it to an array of bytes - PREFERRED METHOD
''' ImageToBase64    - Takes in an image and converts it to a Base64 string
''' ByteArrayToImage - Takes in a byte array and converts it to an image - PREFERRED METHOD
''' Base64ToImage    - Takes in a Base64 string and converts it to an image
''' </summary>
''' <remarks>Thanks to jmcilhinney for his insight and remarks on the following methods</remarks>
 
Public Class I2BB2I
 
    Public Shared Function ImageToByteArray(img As Image) As Byte()
        Using strm As New MemoryStream
            img.Save(strm, img.RawFormat)
            Return strm.GetBuffer()
        End Using
    End Function
 
    Public Shared Function ImageToBase64(img As Image) As String
        Return Convert.ToBase64String(ImageToByteArray(img))
    End Function
 
    Public Overloads Shared Function ByteArrayToImage(data As Byte()) As Image
        Using strm As New MemoryStream(data)
            Return Image.FromStream(strm)
        End Using
    End Function
 
    Public Overloads Shared Function Base64ToImage(text As String) As Image
        Return ByteArrayToImage(Convert.FromBase64String(text))
    End Function
End Class

The attached example is a quick and dirty way of showing what the small class can do. This was written in VS2012, but should convert backwards pretty easily if you are looking to play with the source code. Feel free to modify it and do whatever you want to it.