Develop Reference

HTML5 Canvas - create striped canvas with lineWidth and createPattern()

I want to create a striped pattern with HTML5 canvas, where the thickness of lines for the striped pattern should be configurable using the property lineWidth.
After I read this answer, I understood that for coord x,y from moveTo()/lineTo(), I need to add like 2.5 for the ctx.lineWidth =5 or maybe create a formula based on thickness like this example. But I can't figure out how to change the values of those coordinates so the pattern remains striped like on the right, not random like in left
Below is my code. How should I calculate the coordonates x,y?
function createStrippedPattern(color) {
const pattern = document.createElement('canvas');
// create a 10x10 px canvas for the pattern's base shape
pattern.width = 10;
pattern.height = 10;
// get the context for drawing
const context = pattern.getContext('2d');
context.strokeStyle = color;
context.lineWidth = 5;
// draw 1st line of the shape
context.beginPath();
context.moveTo(2, 0);
context.lineTo(10, 8);
context.stroke();
// draw 2st line of the shape
context.beginPath();
context.moveTo(0, 8);
context.lineTo(2, 10);
context.stroke();
return context.createPattern(pattern, 'repeat');
};
function fillWithPattern(targetCanvas, patternCanvas) {
const ctx = targetCanvas.getContext('2d', {
antialias: false,
depth: false
});
const width = targetCanvas.width;
const height = targetCanvas.height;
ctx.fillStyle = patternCanvas;
ctx.fillRect(0, 0, width, height);
return targetCanvas;
}
fillWithPattern(
document.getElementById("targetCanvas"),
createStrippedPattern("red")
);
<canvas id="targetCanvas" width=30 height=30></canvas>

Code logic problems
The size of the pattern needs to match the slope of the line. That size must be expanded to allow for a set spacing between the lines.
Your code has a fixed size that does not match the slope of either of the lines you draw.
The lines you draw are both in different directions. You will never get them to create a repeatable pattern.
The code you have given is too ambiguous for me to understand what you wish to achieve thus the example adds some constraints that considers my best guess at your requirements.
Tileable striped pattern
The function in the example below creates a striped repeatable (tilded) pattern.
The function createStripedPattern(lineWidth, spacing, slope, color) requires 4 arguments.
lineWidth width of the line to draw
spacing distance between lines. Eg if lineWidth is 5 and spacing is 10 then the space between the lines is the same width as the line.
slope The slope of the line eg 45 degree slope is 1. I have only tested value >= 1 and am not sure if it will work below 1.
Nor have I tested very large slopes. The point of the example is to show how to draw the line on the pattern to repeat without holes.
color Color of line to draw.
The function works by creating a canvas that will fit the constraints given by the arguments. It then draws a line from the top left to bottom right corners. This leaves a gap in the repeating pattern at the top right and bottom left corners.
To fill the missing pixels two more lines are drawn. One through the top right corner and the other through the bottom left.
Note you could also just copy the canvas onto itself (offset to the corners) to fill the missing corner pixels. For pixel art type patterns this may be preferable.
Note that canvas sizes are integer values and lines are rendered at sub pixel accuracy. For very small input values there will be artifact as the relative error between the canvas (integer) pixel size and required (floating point) size grows larger
Example
The example contains the function to create the pattern as outlined above and then renders some examples.
The first canvas has inset patterns with each pattern increasing the line width will keeping the spacing and slope constant.
The second canvas just fills with a fixed lineWidth as 4, spacing as 8 and a slope of 3
function createAARotatedPattern(lineWidth, spacing, ang, color) {
const can = document.createElement('canvas');
const w = can.width = 2;
const h = can.height = spacing;
const ctx = can.getContext('2d');
ctx.fillStyle = color;
ctx.fillRect(0, 0, 2, lineWidth);
const pat = ctx.createPattern(can, 'repeat');
const xAx = Math.cos(ang);
const xAy = Math.sin(ang);
pat.setTransform(new DOMMatrix([xAx, xAy, -xAy, xAx, 0, 0]));
return pat;
}
function createStripedPattern(lineWidth, spacing, slope, color) {
const can = document.createElement('canvas');
const len = Math.hypot(1, slope);
const w = can.width = 1 / len + spacing + 0.5 | 0; // round to nearest pixel
const h = can.height = slope / len + spacing * slope + 0.5 | 0;
const ctx = can.getContext('2d');
ctx.strokeStyle = color;
ctx.lineWidth = lineWidth;
ctx.beginPath();
// Line through top left and bottom right corners
ctx.moveTo(0, 0);
ctx.lineTo(w, h);
// Line through top right corner to add missing pixels
ctx.moveTo(0, -h);
ctx.lineTo(w * 2, h);
// Line through bottom left corner to add missing pixels
ctx.moveTo(-w, 0);
ctx.lineTo(w, h * 2);
ctx.stroke();
return ctx.createPattern(can, 'repeat');
};
function fillWithPattern(canvas, pattern, inset = 0) {
const ctx = canvas.getContext('2d');
ctx.clearRect(inset, inset, canvas.width - inset * 2, canvas.height - inset * 2);
ctx.fillStyle = pattern;
ctx.fillRect(inset, inset, canvas.width - inset * 2, canvas.height - inset * 2);
return canvas;
}
fillWithPattern(targetCanvas, createStripedPattern(2, 6, 2, "#000"));
fillWithPattern(targetCanvas, createStripedPattern(3, 6, 2, "#000"), 50);
fillWithPattern(targetCanvas, createStripedPattern(4, 6, 2, "#000"), 100);
fillWithPattern(targetCanvas1, createStripedPattern(4, 8, 3, "#000"));
var y = 0;
var ang = 0;
const ctx = targetCanvas2.getContext('2d');
while (y < targetCanvas2.height) {
ctx.fillStyle = createAARotatedPattern(2, 5, ang, "#000");
ctx.fillRect(0, y, targetCanvas2.width, 34);
y += 40;
ang += 2 * Math.PI / (targetCanvas2.height / 40);
}
<canvas id="targetCanvas" width="300" height="300"></canvas>
<canvas id="targetCanvas1" width="300" height="300"></canvas>
<canvas id="targetCanvas2" width="300" height="600"></canvas>
Update
The above example now includes a second method createAARotatedPattern(lineWidth, spacing, ang, color) that uses the pattern transform. ang replaces slope from the original function and represents the angle of the pattern in radians.
It works by drawing the pattern aligned to the x axis and then rotates the pattern via a DOMMatrix.
It will create a pattern at any angle, though personally the quality can at times be less than the first method.
The example has a 3 canvas with strips showing the pattern drawn at various angles. (Note you do not have to recreate the pattern to change the angle)

HTML5 Canvas atan2 off by 90 degrees

I was trying to get the green triangle to rotate about its center and orient itself towards the mouse position. I was able to accomplish this, and you can view the full code and result here:
https://codepen.io/Carpetfizz/project/editor/DQbEVe
Consider the following lines of code:
r = Math.atan2(mouseY - centerY, mouseX - centerX)
ctx.rotate(r + Math.PI/2)
I arbitrarily added Math.PI/2 to my angle calculation because without it, the rotations seemed to be 90 degrees off (by inspection). I want a better understanding of the coordinate system which atan2 is being calculated with respect to so I can justify the reason for offsetting the angle by 90 degrees (and hopefully simplify the code).
EDIT:
To my understanding, Math.atan2 is measuring the angle illustrated in blue. Shouldn't rotating both triangles that blue angle orient it towards the mouse mouse pointer (orange dot) ? Well - obviously not since it's the same angle and they are two different orientations, but I cannot seem to prove this to myself.

This is because of how the Math.atan2 works.
From MDN:
This is the counterclockwise angle, measured in radians, between the positive X axis, and the point (x, y).
In above figure, the positive X axis is the horizontal segment going from the junction to the right-most position.
To make it clearer, here is an interactive version of this diagram, where x, y values are converted to [-1 ~ 1] values.
const ctx = canvas.getContext('2d'),
w = canvas.width,
h = canvas.height,
radius = 0.3;
ctx.textAlign = 'center';
canvas.onmousemove = canvas.onclick = e => {
// offset mouse values so they are relative to the center of our canvas
draw(as(e.offsetX), as(e.offsetY));
}
draw(0, 0);
function draw(x, y) {
clear();
drawCross();
drawLineToPoint(x, y);
drawPoint(x, y);
const angle = Math.atan2(y, x);
drawAngle(angle);
writeAngle(angle);
}
function clear() {
ctx.clearRect(0, 0, w, h);
}
function drawCross() {
ctx.lineWidth = 1;
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.moveTo(s(0), s(-1));
ctx.lineTo(s(0), s(1));
ctx.moveTo(s(-1), s(0));
ctx.lineTo(s(0), s(0));
ctx.strokeStyle = ctx.fillStyle = '#2e404f';
ctx.stroke();
// positive X axis
ctx.lineWidth = 3;
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.moveTo(s(0), s(0));
ctx.lineTo(s(1), s(0));
ctx.stroke();
ctx.lineWidth = 1;
ctx.font = '20px/1 sans-serif';
ctx.fillText('+X', s(1) - 20, s(0) - 10);
}
function drawPoint(x, y) {
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.arc(s(x), s(y), 10, 0, Math.PI * 2);
ctx.fillStyle = 'red';
ctx.fill();
ctx.font = '12px/1 sans-serif';
ctx.fillText(`x: ${x.toFixed(2)} y: ${y.toFixed(2)}`, s(x), s(y) - 15);
}
function drawLineToPoint(x, y) {
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.moveTo(s(0), s(0));
ctx.lineTo(s(x), s(y));
ctx.strokeStyle = 'red';
ctx.setLineDash([5, 5]);
ctx.stroke();
ctx.setLineDash([0]);
}
function drawAngle(angle) {
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.moveTo(s(radius), s(0));
ctx.arc(s(0), s(0), radius * w / 2,
0, // 'arc' method also starts from positive X axis (3 o'clock)
angle,
true // Math.atan2 returns the anti-clockwise angle
);
ctx.strokeStyle = ctx.fillStyle = 'blue';
ctx.stroke();
ctx.font = '20px/1 sans-serif';
ctx.fillText('∂: ' + angle.toFixed(2), s(0), s(0));
}
// below methods will add the w / 2 offset
// because canvas coords set 0, 0 at top-left corner
// converts from [-1 ~ 1] to px
function s(value) {
return value * w / 2 + (w / 2);
}
// converts from px to [-1 ~ 1]
function as(value) {
return (value - w / 2) / (w / 2);
}
<canvas id="canvas" width="500" height="500"></canvas>
So now, if we go back to your image, it currently points to the top (positive Y axis), while the angle you just measured is realtive to the x axis, so it doesn't point where you intended.
Now we know the problem, the solution is quite easy:
either apply the + Math.PI / 2 offset to your angle like you did,
either modify your original image so that it points to the positive X axis directly.

The coordinate system on canvas works with 0° pointing right. This means anything you want to point "up" must be initially drawn right.
All you need to do in this case is to change this drawing:
to
pointing "up" 0°
and you can strip the math back to what you'd expect it to be.
var ctx = c.getContext("2d"), img = new Image;
img.onload = go; img.src = "https://i.stack.imgur.com/Yj9DU.jpg";
function draw(pos) {
var cx = c.width>>1,
cy = c.height>>1,
angle = Math.atan2(pos.y - cy, pos.x - cx);
ctx.setTransform(1,0,0,1,cx, cy);
ctx.rotate(angle);
ctx.drawImage(img, -img.width>>1, -img.height>>1);
}
function go() {
ctx.globalCompositeOperation = "copy";
window.onmousemove = function(e) {draw({x: e.clientX, y: e.clientY})}
}
html, body {margin:0;background:#ccc}
#c {background:#fff}
<canvas id=c width=600 height=600></canvas>

When you do arctangents in math class, you're generally dealing with an y-axis that increases going upwards. In most computer graphics systems, however, including canvas graphics, y increases going downward. [erroneous statement deleted]
Edit: I have to admit what I wrote before was wrong for two reasons:
A change in the direction of the axis would be compensated for by adding π, not π/2.
The canvas context rotate function rotates clockwise for positive angles, and that alone should compensate for the flip of the y-axis.
I played around with a copy of your code in Plunker, and now I realize the 90° rotation simply compensates for the starting orientation of the graphic image you're drawing. If the arrowhead pointed right to start with, instead of straight up, you wouldn't need to add π/2.

I encountered the same problem and was able to achieve the desired result with a following axis 'trick':
// Default usage (works fine if your image / shape points to the RIGHT)
let angle = Math.atan2(delta_y, delta_x);
// 'Tricky' usage (works fine if your image / shape points to the LEFT)
let angle = Math.atan2(delta_y, -delta_x);
// 'Tricky' usage (works fine if your image / shape points to the BOTTOM)
let angle = Math.atan2(delta_x, delta_y);
// 'Tricky' usage (works fine if your image / shape points to the TOP)
let angle = Math.atan2(delta_x, -delta_y);

Multiple light sources on canvas

I want to place a number of light sources on a background for a game I'm making, which works great with one light source as shown below:
This is achieved by placing a .png image above everything else that becomes more transperant towards the center, like this:
Works great for one light source, but I need another approach where I can add more and move the light sources around.
I have considered drawing a similar "shadow layer" pixel by pixel for each frame, and calculate the transparency depending of the distance to each light source. However, that would probably be very slow and I'm sure there are way better solutions to this problem.
The images are just examples and each frame will have considerably more content to move around and update using requestAnimationFrame.
Is there a light weight and simple way to achieve this? Thanks in advance!
Edit
With the help of ViliusL, I came up with this masking solution:
http://jsfiddle.net/CuC5w/1/
// Create canvas
var canvas = document.createElement('canvas');
var ctx = canvas.getContext('2d');
canvas.width = 300;
canvas.height = 300;
document.body.appendChild(canvas);
// Draw background
var img=document.getElementById("cat");
ctx.drawImage(img,0,0);
// Create shadow canvas
var shadowCanvas = document.createElement('canvas');
var shadowCtx = shadowCanvas.getContext('2d');
shadowCanvas.width = canvas.width;
shadowCanvas.height = canvas.height;
document.body.appendChild(shadowCanvas);
// Make it black
shadowCtx.fillStyle= '#000';
shadowCtx.fillRect(0,0,canvas.width,canvas.height);
// Turn canvas into mask
shadowCtx.globalCompositeOperation = "destination-out";
// RadialGradient as light source #1
gradient = shadowCtx.createRadialGradient(80, 150, 0, 80, 150, 50);
gradient.addColorStop(0, "rgba(255, 255, 255, 1.0)");
gradient.addColorStop(1, "rgba(255, 255, 255, .1)");
shadowCtx.fillStyle = gradient;
shadowCtx.fillRect(0, 0, canvas.width, canvas.height);
// RadialGradient as light source #2
gradient = shadowCtx.createRadialGradient(220, 150, 0, 220, 150, 50);
gradient.addColorStop(0, "rgba(255, 255, 255, 1.0)");
gradient.addColorStop(1, "rgba(255, 255, 255, .1)");
shadowCtx.fillStyle = gradient;
shadowCtx.fillRect(0, 0, canvas.width, canvas.height);

Another way to play with light is to use the globalCompositeOperation mode 'ligther' to ligthen things, and just use globalAlpha to darken things.
First here's an image, with a cartoon lightening on the left, and a more realistic lightening on the right, but you'd rather watch the fiddle, since it's animated :
http://jsfiddle.net/gamealchemist/ABfVj/
So how i did things :
To darken :
- Choose a darkening color( most likely black, but you can choose a red or another color to teint the result).
- choose an opacity ( 0.3 seems a good start value ).
- fillRect the area you want to darken.
function darken(x, y, w, h, darkenColor, amount) {
ctx.fillStyle = darkenColor;
ctx.globalAlpha = amount;
ctx.fillRect(x, y, w, h);
ctx.globalAlpha = 1;
}
To lighten :
- Choose a lightening color. Beware that this color's r,g,b will be added to the previous point's r,g,b : if you use a high value your color will get burnt.
- change the globalCompositeOperation to 'lighter'
- you might change opacity also, to have more control over the lightening.
- fillRect or arc the area you want to lighten.
If you draw several circles while in lighter mode, the results will add up, so you can choose a quite low value and draw several circles.
function ligthen(x, y, radius, color) {
ctx.save();
var rnd = 0.03 * Math.sin(1.1 * Date.now() / 1000);
radius = radius * (1 + rnd);
ctx.globalCompositeOperation = 'lighter';
ctx.fillStyle = '#0B0B00';
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.arc(x, y, radius, 0, 2 * π);
ctx.fill();
ctx.fillStyle = color;
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.arc(x, y, radius * 0.90+rnd, 0, 2 * π);
ctx.fill();
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.arc(x, y, radius * 0.4+rnd, 0, 2 * π);
ctx.fill();
ctx.restore();
}
Notice that i added a sinusoidal variation to make the light more living.
Ligthen : another way :
You can also, while still using the 'ligther' mode, use a gradient to have a smoother effect (first one is more cartoon like, unless you draw a lot of circles.).
function ligthenGradient(x, y, radius) {
ctx.save();
ctx.globalCompositeOperation = 'lighter';
var rnd = 0.05 * Math.sin(1.1 * Date.now() / 1000);
radius = radius * (1 + rnd);
var radialGradient = ctx.createRadialGradient(x, y, 0, x, y, radius);
radialGradient.addColorStop(0.0, '#BB9');
radialGradient.addColorStop(0.2 + rnd, '#AA8');
radialGradient.addColorStop(0.7 + rnd, '#330');
radialGradient.addColorStop(0.90, '#110');
radialGradient.addColorStop(1, '#000');
ctx.fillStyle = radialGradient;
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.arc(x, y, radius, 0, 2 * π);
ctx.fill();
ctx.restore();
}
i also added here a sin variation.
Rq : creating a gradient on each draw will create garbage : store the gradient if you use a single gradient, and store them in an array if you want to animate the gradients.
If you are using the same light in several places, have a single gradient built, centered on (0,0), and translate the canvas before drawing always with this single gradient.
Rq 2 : you can use clipping to prevent some parts of the screen to be lightened (if there's an obstacle).
I added the blue circle on my example to show this.
So you might want to ligthen directly your scene with those effects, or create separately a light layer that you darken/lighten as you want before drawImage it on the screen.
There are too many scenari to discuss them here (light animated or not, clipping or not, pre-compute a light layer or not, ...) but as far as speed is concerned, for Safari and iOS safari, the solution using rect/arc draws -either with gradient or a solid fill- will be rocket faster than drawing an image/canvas.
On Chrome it will be quite the opposite : it's faster to draw an image than to draw each geometry when the geometry count raises.
Firefox is rather similar to Chrome for this.

your png should have full transparent corners and not transparent white in middle.
or you can draw this, but not pixel by pixel like here jsfiddle.net/pr9r7/2/
More examples: jsfiddle.net/pr9r7/3/ http://codepen.io/cwolves/pen/prvnb

Here is my Take on it:
A. Don't worry about performance until you have tried it out. The Canvas is pretty darn fast at drawing.
B. Rather than having a image with dark Corners and a Transparent middle. Why don't you try and make it more "IRL" and have the overall world be more Dark and let the light-source illuminate the Area? Highlight a small area, instead of darken everything EXCEPT a small Area.

HTML5: Antialiasing leaves traces when I erase the image

I want to move a widget around on the canvas, and for various reasons I don't want to use sprites. I'm using the latest version of Chrome. In order to move the widget, I 'undraw' it and then redraw it in another place. By 'undraw', I mean that I just draw the same image in the same place, but draw it with the same color as the background, so the widget disappears completely before I draw the new one. The problem is that when I 'undraw', traces of the original image remain on the canvas. I've poked around on related questions here and haven't found anything that helps. I understand the problem of drawing a one-pixel line and getting anti-aliasing, so I set my line width to 2 (and various other non-integer values), but to no avail. Anyone have any ideas? Here's a fiddle demo, and here's the function that does the update:
function draw(){
if(previousX !== null) {
ctx.lineWidth = 1;
ctx.fillStyle = '#ffffff';
ctx.strokeStyle = '#ffffff';
drawCircle(previousX, previousY, 20);
}
ctx.lineWidth = 1;
ctx.fillStyle = '#000000';
ctx.strokeStyle = '#000000';
drawCircle(x, y, 20);
console.log('drew circle (' + x + ', ' + y + ')');
previousX = x;
previousY = y;
}
P.S. I'm just a hobbyist with no great experience in graphics, so please dumb-down your answer a bit if possible.

When your draw a shape with anti-aliasing, you are doing a solid covering of some pixels, but only a partial covering of the edge pixels. The trouble is that pixels (temporarily ignoring LCD panels) are indivisible units. So how do we partially cover pixels? We achieve this using the alpha channel.
The alpha channel (and alpha blending) combines the colour at the edge of a circle with the colour underneath it. This happens when the circle only partially covers the pixel. Here's a quick diagram to visualise this issue.
The mixing of colours causes a permanent change that is not undone by drawing the circle again in the background colour. The reason: colour mixing happens again, but that just causes the effect to soften.
In short, redrawing only covers up the pixels with total coverage. The edge pixels are not completely part of the circle, so you cannot cover up the edge effects.
If you need to erase the circle, rather think about it in terms of restoring what was originally there. You can probably copy the original content, then draw the circle, then when you want to move the circle, restore the original content and repeat the process.
This previous SO question may give you some ideas about copying canvas regions. It uses the drawImage method. The best solution would combine the getImageData and putImageData methods. I have modified your Fiddle example to show you how you might do this. You could try the following code:
var x, y, vx, vy;
var previousX = null, previousY = null;
var data = null;
function draw(){
ctx.lineWidth = 2.5;
ctx.fillStyle = '#000000';
ctx.strokeStyle = '#FF0000';
drawCircle(x, y, 20);
previousX = x;
previousY = y;
}
function drawCircle(x, y, r){
// Step 3: Replace the stuff that was underneath the previous circle
if (data != null)
{
ctx.putImageData(data, previousX - r-5, previousY - r-5);
}
// Step 1: Copy the region in which we intend to draw a circle
data = ctx.getImageData(x - r-5, y - r-5, 2 * r + 10, 2 * r + 10);
// Step 2: Draw the circle
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.arc(x, y, r, 0, Math.PI*2, true);
ctx.closePath();
ctx.stroke();
ctx.fill();
}

How can i draw a Square in HTML5 Canvas at run time?

I am working on a HTML5 Project.There is a drawing graphics API to draw Rectangle (fillRectStrokeRect).But how can i draw a SQUARE. I have tried the following way to draw it
CODE
getMouse(e);
x2=mx; y2=my;
var width=endX-startX;
var height=endY-startY;
annCanvasContext.beginPath();
annCanvasContext.lineWidth=borderWidth;
var centerX=width/2;
var centerY=width/2;
var radius=width/2;
annCanvasContext.arc(centerX+5, centerY+5, radius, 0, 2 * Math.PI, false);
annCanvasContext.stroke();

Use fillRect or strokeRect with the width and height being equal.
var x = 0, y = 0,
side = 10;
ctx.fillRect(x, y, side, side);
Demo
As you say in the comments, if you want to fit the largest square in a circle, it's more Math related than about code. I'll trying explaining it to you, but you'll probably find better, more visual explanations elsewhere on the Internet.
Draw the diameter of the circle in a way that it divides your square into two equal parts. Now one part is a right angled triangle, which has two of its sides equal. We know the diameter. Using the Pythogorean theorem, you get this equation:
side^2 + side^2 = diameter^2.
Let's find the side now.
2(side^2) = diameter^2
side^2 = (diameter^2)/2
side = Math.sqrt( (diameter^2)/2 )
Now, to turn this into code.
var ctx = document.getElementById('canvas').getContext('2d'),
radius = 20;
ctx.canvas.addEventListener('click', function (e){
ctx.fillStyle = 'black';
ctx.arc(e.pageX, e.pageY, radius, 0, Math.PI*2, false);
ctx.fill();
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.fillStyle = 'red';
var diameter = radius * 2;
var side = Math.sqrt( (diameter * diameter)/2 );
ctx.fillRect(e.pageX - side/2, e.pageY - side/2, side, side);
ctx.closePath();
}, false);
This would draw a square inside a circle wherever you click on the canvas.
Demo