Colors and Shapes

Now that you’ve drawn your first rectangle, let’s go further and explore more shapes and colors.

You’ll learn how to:

Draw rectangles and circles in different colors
Create gradients
Use helper functions like dvline, dhline, and dline to draw more efficiently

All of this runs fast and smoothly thanks to gint.

1. Drawing Colored Rectangles: Flags!

Let’s start with some rectangles in different colors.
We’ll draw mini flags of France and Germany using colored rectangles.

Mini France Flag

import gint

gint.dclear(gint.C_WHITE)

# Blue, white, red vertical bars
gint.drect(10, 10, 30, 50, gint.C_RGB(0, 0, 31))   # Blue
gint.drect(30, 10, 50, 50, gint.C_WHITE)           # White
gint.drect(50, 10, 70, 50, gint.C_RGB(31, 0, 0))  # Red

Each drect() call draws a vertical bar of the flag.
The C_RGB(r, g, b) function lets you mix any color.

Mini Germany Flag

# Black, red, yellow horizontal stripes
gint.drect(80, 10, 130, 20, gint.C_BLACK)
gint.drect(80, 20, 130, 30, gint.C_RGB(31, 0, 0))     # Red
gint.drect(80, 30, 130, 40, gint.C_RGB(31, 31, 0))   # Yellow

This one uses horizontal bars instead. Simple!

2. Drawing Circles and Ellipses

You can draw filled or unfilled shapes using dcircle() and dellipse().

Filled and Unfilled Circles

gint.dcircle(30, 80, 10, gint.C_BLACK, gint.C_WHITE)   # Filled
gint.dcircle(60, 80, 10, gint.C_NONE, gint.C_BLACK)    # Outline only

(x, y, r) is the center and radius
First color is the fill
Second is the border

Use C_NONE to skip the fill or border.

Filled and Unfilled Ellipses

gint.dellipse(100, 70, 120, 90, gint.C_RGB(28, 28, 31), gint.C_BLACK)
gint.dellipse(130, 70, 150, 90, gint.C_NONE, gint.C_BLUE)

You define the ellipse using a rectangle: (x1, y1) to (x2, y2)
Again, choose fill and border colors

3. Drawing a Gradient Rectangle (Y Axis Only)

Let’s draw a rectangle pixel by pixel, changing the color as we go vertically.

for y in range(0, 32):
    color = gint.C_RGB(0, y, y)  # From black to cyan
    for x in range(10, 40):
        gint.dpixel(x, 100+y, color)

What’s happening?

We loop over y, from top to bottom
For each row, we pick a color
Then we draw that row using individual pixels

This is how gradients are built: same row = same color.

4. Drawing a Diagonal Gradient (X and Y Based)

Let’s now build a second rectangle where the color depends on both x and y.

for y in range(0, 32):
    for x in range(0, 32):
        r = x
        g = y
        b = 31 - r
        color = gint.C_RGB(r, g, b)
        gint.dpixel(60+x, 100+y, color)

Now the color changes horizontally and vertically, producing a 2D gradient. Remember that C_RGB uses RGB555, so 31 is the max color value and 0 the minimum.

5. Drawing Gutter Lines (Helper Functions)

Use dvline() and dhline() to draw fast vertical/horizontal lines.

gray = gint.C_RGB(18, 18, 18)

# Vertical "gutters"
gint.dvline(10, gray)
gint.dvline(gint.DWIDTH-10, gray)

# Horizontal lines
gint.dhline(10, gray)
gint.dhline(gint.DHEIGHT-10, gray)

These are perfect for drawing menus, borders, and separators.

6. Drawing a Box Using Lines

Let’s draw a simple outlined square using dline().

gint.dline(150, 200, 180, 200, gint.C_BLACK)  # Top
gint.dline(180, 200, 180, 230, gint.C_BLACK)  # Right
gint.dline(180, 230, 150, 230, gint.C_BLACK)  # Bottom
gint.dline(150, 230, 150, 200, gint.C_BLACK)  # Left

This draws a rectangle manually, line by line.

You can use this to draw any polygon or shape.

Final Code Block

Here’s a simplified version that runs everything:

Screenshot of the final result

import gint

gint.dclear(gint.C_WHITE)

# Flags
gint.drect(10, 10, 30, 50, gint.C_RGB(0, 0, 31))
gint.drect(30, 10, 50, 50, gint.C_WHITE)
gint.drect(50, 10, 70, 50, gint.C_RGB(31, 0, 0))

gint.drect(80, 10, 130, 20, gint.C_BLACK)
gint.drect(80, 20, 130, 30, gint.C_RGB(31, 0, 0))
gint.drect(80, 30, 130, 40, gint.C_RGB(31, 31, 0))

# Circles
gint.dcircle(30, 80, 10, gint.C_BLACK, gint.C_WHITE)
gint.dcircle(60, 80, 10, gint.C_NONE, gint.C_BLACK)

# Ellipses
gint.dellipse(100, 70, 120, 90, gint.C_RGB(28, 28, 31), gint.C_BLACK)
gint.dellipse(130, 70, 150, 90, gint.C_NONE, gint.C_BLUE)

# Gradient Y
for y in range(0, 32):
    color = gint.C_RGB(0, y, y)  # From black to cyan
    for x in range(10, 40):
        gint.dpixel(x, 100+y, color)

# Gradient XY
for y in range(0, 32):
    for x in range(0, 32):
        r = x
        g = y
        b = 31 -r
        color = gint.C_RGB(r, g, b)
        gint.dpixel(60+x, 100+y, color)

# Gutter lines
gray = gint.C_RGB(18, 18, 18)
gint.dvline(10, gray)
gint.dvline(gint.DWIDTH-10, gray)
gint.dhline(10, gray)
gint.dhline(gint.DHEIGHT-10, gray)

# Box with lines
gint.dline(150, 200, 180, 200, gint.C_BLACK)
gint.dline(180, 200, 180, 230, gint.C_BLACK)
gint.dline(180, 230, 150, 230, gint.C_BLACK)
gint.dline(150, 230, 150, 200, gint.C_BLACK)

gint.dupdate()
gint.getkey()

What’s next?

Next up: Let’s try to make them move !

🎮 Moving a Rectangle Move shapes around with key input