

Visual Studio project viewheic builds the image viewer. setup, a self-extracting msi-based installer.The product consists of three Visual Studio projects plus a tool set for building the msi. So, we use libheif to decode HEIC, and use GDI and WIC to manipulate, and convert, and render HEIC. Set in a DIB form, the image can be processed using a well-known method of bitmap manipulation. We are however interested in how to decode it, and get a bitmap in a familiar data format, like the RBG-based Win32 DIB. We are not concerned with how HEIF works. The idea seems rather contradictory, but there you have it. HEIF seeks to achieve a high degree of data packing without losing fidelity. Nokia, a major HEIF promotor, publishes reference materials here. Photographs taken with Apple's iPhones save as HEIC files. HEIF stands for High Efficiency Image File. HEVC stands for High Efficiency Video Coing. It's the MIME type name of images encoded in the HEVC coding format and packaged in the HEIF file format. What is HEIC? It stands for High Efficiency Image Container. Users could purchase the codec from Windows Store for a small license fee. On Windows 10 and earlier, users may not be able to preview image files with extension.
The viewer uses the GNU libheif library to achieve image decompression. It lets Windows users preview, display and print. Maximilian's HEIC image viewer is a Windows Explorer add-on written in C++.
