Working with big images and AIR (memory issue: SOLVED!)

A couple of weeks ago I solved a big problem in an AIR application that I’m working on.
This application is an images manipulator; the most important problem when you work on a desktop application is that a user could be uses any kind of images, from 200kb to 5mb!

This problem is not easy to solve when you work with a lots of images because memory use increase a lots.

First of all I tried to use a “normal” load of an images working with Flex Image component, but every time that I load an 3MB image from a folder in my desktop, allocated memory grows up a lot! I arrive to use, with 10 images of the same dimension (3MB each one), 750MB of memory allocated for my application… that’s crazy!!!
If you want create a batch you have so many problem to preview images and working with them.

So I find a good solution to use less memory (30 – 40MB for all AIR application) working with BitmapData class and Loader class.
I create a zip file where you can find a sample with a couple of images, download it to take a look.

In this sample you can find 2 buttons, the first one load an image with Image component the other one load image with a class that I made to solve this problem.
When you try it, please open Task Manager (on Windows: right click in system bar) or Activity Monitor (on Mac: Applications>Utilities) and take a look at process and memory that every method use to do the same thing.

If you have any comment, suggestion or so on, please feel free to add a comment at this post or contact me directly.

Enjoy!

Published by

luca mezzalira

Being associated with the industry since 2004, I have lent my expertise predominantly in the solution architecture field. I have gained accolades for revolutionising the scalability of frontend architectures with micro-frontends, from increasing the efficiency of workflows, to delivering quality in products. My colleagues know me as an excellent communicator who believes in using an interactive approach for understanding and solving problems of varied scopes. I helped DAZN becoming a global streaming platform in just 5 years, now as Principal Architect at AWS, I'm helping our customers in the media and entertainment space to deliver cost-effective and scalable cloud solutions. Moreover, I'm sharing with the community the best practices to develop cloud-native architectures solving technical and organizational challenges. My core industry knowledge has been instrumental in resolving complex architectural and integration challenges. Working within the scopes of a plethora of technical roles such as tech lead, solutions architect and CTO, I have developed a precise understanding of various technicalities which has helped me in maximizing value of my company and products in my current leadership roles. View all posts by luca mezzalira

9 thoughts on “Working with big images and AIR (memory issue: SOLVED!)”

Mister says:

August 28, 2008 at 20:49

I downloaded your AIR application and code sample. The tests I did on my Mac did not show any significant difference in memory or process for either image loading. Maybe you need to create an example that shows the initial problem, loading multiple images into the application uses excessive memory.

I have a similar issue when I upload ByteArray data using FileStream in AIR. The entire bytes of a file are first read into AIR, then posted to a web site. Loading the entire bytes of the file increases the application memory significantly. I don’t think using ByteArray or BitMap saves any CPU memory or processing.

– Mister

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lucamezzalira says:

August 28, 2008 at 23:07

Yes I’m agree with you, I’ll create a sample that it will produce the initial problem. 😀

Meanwhile I suggest to take a look at: http://blog.paranoidferret.com/index.php/2007/12/11/flex-tutorial-an-asynchronous-jpeg-encoder/

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seme1 says:

September 3, 2008 at 12:16

I am having memory problems with the JPEGAsyncEncoder you mentioned. When loading many images, it consumes too much memory. Have you tried your class with JPEGAsyncEncoder ? or rather ,, can is there a way to use it with JPEGAsyncEncoder ?

Thank you in advance for your help

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Ashish says:

November 8, 2008 at 15:06

Thanks for your valuable code.
Could you tell me how can I invoke Garbage Collector in Flash Palyer. Since I am making an Explorer kind of thing in AIR and when i select a folder contents with thumbnail view i take almost 500 MB. any work around on that

Thanks in Advance
Ashish

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1. Robert Reinhard says:
  
  October 27, 2009 at 20:21
  
  Re: Ashish. It’s not possible to invoke the garbage directly.
  
  Reply
2. Robert Reinhard says:
  
  October 27, 2009 at 20:29
  
  Wait, nvm, just found this: http://livedocs.adobe.com/flex/3/langref/flash/system/System.html#gc()
  
  Reply
  1. lucamezzalira says:
    
    October 27, 2009 at 21:18
    
    Dear Robert,
    you can use gc() only when you are testing your app not in a final release version.
    So if you want to force GC you must work with FP 10 and UnloadAndStop method of Loader object and you can solve this problem
karthikeyan.cs says:

January 17, 2010 at 07:51

hi… i am also facing the same issue with my application. i tried to download your files, but the link you given is take me to some other sites. could you please let me know the link..

Thanks in advance,
karthikeyan.cs

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tomzwisi says:

April 8, 2012 at 15:46

Hey, I was searching for a solution and came across your blog. If you are targeting a mac, you could create proxy images with SIPS and then load them in flash (AIR only). I posted a small tutorial on my blog http://www.inklink.co.at/blog/?p=90

hope it helps 🙂

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