Fading forms in and out

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• Download source - 29.5 KB

Introduction

Have you ever thought that your Windows forms have looked boring and wanted them to look more "cool"? Well, in just a few lines of code, you can have a form that fades in and fades out.

Background

I had the idea for this when I finished making a few applications in C# and VB.NET. I had quite easily found articles through Google about fading, and had placed it inside my code quite easily. Then, my only VB.NET project came up, and I thought "How could I do it now". Well, I set out, and soon came up with the following.

Using the code

This code uses the following controls:

• Timer1 - To fade the form out
• Timer2 - To fade the form in

First things first. Create a new project and call it Fade Form. Once the generated form appears, add two Timer controls to the form called Timer1 and Timer2. Double click Timer1 and the code editor will appear. Add the following code:

'This will decrement the opacity.
Me.Opacity -= 0.06
'Now that the form is at zero opacity we must 'dispose' of the form.
If Me.Opacity = 0 Then Me.Dispose()

Now, double click Timer2 and add the following code:

Dim opacityFade As Single
'from minimum transparency to maximum transparency with increment .
For opacityFade = 0 To 1 Step 0.01
    Me.Opacity = opacityFade
    Me.Refresh()
'This tells the program to pause for a certain number of milliseconds.
System.Threading.Thread.Sleep(10)
Next opacityFade
Me.Opacity = 1
'Now the fade in has finished we need it to stop.
Timer2.Enabled = False

We now have the functions for the fades. All that is left to do is call them up. To do this, select the form and go to the Properties pane and click the Events button. For Timer1, go to the "Form Closing" event, double click it, and add this:

Timer1.Enabled = True
e.Cancel = True

For Timer2, go to the "Load" event, double click it, and add this:

Timer2.Enabled = True

Here is the whole code:

Public Class Form1

    Private Sub Timer1_Tick(ByVal sender As System.Object, _
                ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Timer1.Tick
        Me.Opacity -= 0.06
        If Me.Opacity = 0 Then Me.Dispose()
    End Sub

    Private Sub Timer2_Tick(ByVal sender As System.Object, _
                ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Timer2.Tick
        Dim opacityFade As Single
        For opacityFade = 0 To 1 Step 0.01
            Me.Opacity = opacityFade
            Me.Refresh()
            System.Threading.Thread.Sleep(10)
        Next opacityFade
        Me.Opacity = 1
        Timer2.Enabled = False
    End Sub

    Private Sub Form1_FormClosing(ByVal sender As System.Object, _
                ByVal e As System.Windows.Forms.FormClosingEventArgs) _
                Handles MyBase.FormClosing
        Timer1.Enabled = True
        e.Cancel = True
    End Sub

    Private Sub Form1_Load(ByVal sender As System.Object, _
                ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles MyBase.Load
        Timer2.Enabled = True
    End Sub
End Class

You now have a fade in and fade out effect.

Points of Interest

If you have any ideas for improvement, I would be more than happy and grateful to add them.