To reduce the number of switchings between textures at runtime, I try to insert support for mega-textures (atlas) into the engine. To generate it, I write a Win32 Java utility that receives several image files with the contents of texels as input, giving mega-textures plus a configuration file with meta information for it. In order for the utility to work, you need to connect to it a ready-made Java library for program work with pictures (picking yourself in the format specifications for too long).
Required functionality:
- The ability to distinguish a picture with an alpha channel from a picture without an alpha channel.
- The ability to insert one picture into another and save the resulting file, plus apply a couple of simple filters (scaling, cropping).
- Support tga, png, jpg, bmp formats and convert between them in different directions.
Surely something similar already exists, so I request a prooflink to the site / documentation, etc.