How to add alpha to a BMP image....

First of all sorry for my poor english
i try to explain my problem
i opened a window 1024x768x16
i loaded a BMP image using Nehe tutorials…
(AUX_RGBImageRec *TextureImage[] )
now i want to add the alpha…because i need to have trasparent part of my texture…
one of my friend suggest me to create a new
variable like this :
GLubyte TexBucata[256 * 256 * 4];
(256 is the dimension of the Image)
the advice is to copy the TextureImage->data
in the new variable adding the alpha value (when i find a particular colour in the original image i set alpha to 0; else alpha=1)

in a 16 bit windows…it doesn’t work…
the colour appears bad…(like in a 256 or less colour)
in a 32 bit windows… the routine works perfectly…
where is the problem?

An easy way to get alpha channel is to use a TGA file format for your graphics. Nehe GLUT version of his tutor has a TGA file loader.

Originally posted by Calca:
[b]First of all sorry for my poor english
i try to explain my problem
i opened a window 1024x768x16
i loaded a BMP image using Nehe tutorials…
(AUX_RGBImageRec *TextureImage )
now i want to add the alpha…because i need to have trasparent part of my texture…
one of my friend suggest me to create a new
variable like this :
GLubyte TexBucata[256 * 256 * 4];
(256 is the dimension of the Image)
the advice is to copy the TextureImage->data
in the new variable adding the alpha value (when i find a particular colour in the original image i set alpha to 0; else alpha=1)

in a 16 bit windows…it doesn’t work…
the colour appears bad…(like in a 256 or less colour)
in a 32 bit windows… the routine works perfectly…
where is the problem? [/b]

BMPs can be 32-bit. You could just use the extra 8 bits for alpha. But if you just want to do masking, this is a bit wasteful. Are you sure the colors don’t look bad in 16-bit because it’s 16-bit color? 16-bit color means only 32 shades each of red and blue, and either 32 or 64 shades of green.

Originally posted by Aaron:
BMPs can be 32-bit. You could just use the extra 8 bits for alpha. But if you just want to do masking, this is a bit wasteful. Are you sure the colors don’t look bad in 16-bit because it’s 16-bit color? 16-bit color means only 32 shades each of red and blue, and either 32 or 64 shades of green.

i am sure , because if i use the
TextureImage->data the colours are oK,
if i use my variable… that has the same date + the alpha bit… the colours are bad