Focusing on Forms and Menus in Visual Basic - 4.16 Creating a Fading Form
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Problem

You want a form to fade out and disappear.

Solution

Sample code folder: Chapter 04\FadingForm

Use the form’sOpacityproperty to slowly fade it out. Create a new Windows Forms application, and add aButtoncontrol namedActCloseto the form. Change the button’sTextproperty toClose. Then add the following source code to the form’s code template:

  Private Sub ActClose_Click(ByVal sender As Object, _
        ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles ActClose.Click
     ' ----- Fade out the form.
     Dim counter As Integer

     For counter = 90 To 10 Step -20
        Me.Opacity = counter / 100
        Me.Refresh()
        Threading.Thread.Sleep(50)
     Next counter

     Me.Close()
  End Sub

Run the program, and click on theClosebutton to see the form fade away.

Discussion

You’ll find that on some systems, the form momentarily blinks to black right when it makes the transition from an opacity of 1.0 to any other opacity value. On such systems, setting the Opacity property to a non-1.0 value during the Loadevent handler still causes a blink, but it does so when the form first opens, not during the cool fadeout.

  Private Sub AboutProgram_Load(ByVal sender As Object, _
        ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Me.Load
     ' ----- Prepare the form for later fade-out.
     Me.Opacity = 0.99
  End Sub

Next: 4.17 Creating a Nonrectangular Form >>
 

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