Loading an image for a game in java

Question

I want to make a 2-D game in Java.It's a very simple one. The problem is that I get a strange rectangle over my hero, because I don't know how to ignore the white space within the picture I have drawn my self.

/// loading the image///
private ImageIcon x= new ImageIcon("path");
private Image hero=x.getImage();

//=============

//=========drowing====


public void paint(Graphics g){

     Graphics2D g2d=(Graphics2D)g;
     g2d.drawImage(background,0,0,null);
     g2d.drawImage(hero,100,100,null);

}

Answer 1

This doesn't really have anything to do with Java. Like @WOUNDEDStevenJones already mentioned, you simply need to save the image as a PNG file with a transparent background.

There are plenty of ways to do this, and google is your friend. I personally use GIMP, and here is a related question that explains how to do this: https://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/questions/5446/making-the-background-of-an-image-transparent-in-gimp

And here is the direct GIMP tutorial: http://docs.gimp.org/en/gimp-using-web-transparency.html

Answer 2

You can use for example photoshop or gimp(free), where you can apply layers. You can do a transparent layer and put your hero to this layer. If your picture with hero has a background color, then you can select (in mentioned programs) only your hero, without background, and after selection you can delete the background. Hope this helps.