# Limitations of hardware - images modes **URL:** \ **Category:** ETC\ **Created:** [July 31, 2017, 8:38pm UTC](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/t/limitations-of-hardware-images-modes/1484 "2017-07-31T20:38:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Zetsumei](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c77e96/32.png) [@Zetsumei](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/u/Zetsumei)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2017, 8:38pm UTC](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/t/limitations-of-hardware-images-modes/1484/1 "2017-07-31T20:38:57Z")
I am very close to purchasing the ETC. I’m glad we have the ability to create our own modes and incorporate image modes. I saw a comment on another post regarding file sizes and keeping the images small so they will load quickly. What are the limitations on this in regards to the hardware specs? I’m looking at the possibility of writing a mode which would use animated gifs. I’d keep those animations very small and down to 2 or three frames each, but just wanted to know if this would even be possible or not. And probably a no on this one, but what about very short video clips? ---
**Author:** ![distropolis](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/forum.critterandguitari.com/distropolis/32/590_2.png) [@distropolis](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/u/distropolis)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2017, 9:34pm UTC](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/t/limitations-of-hardware-images-modes/1484/2 "2017-07-31T21:34:42Z")
Animated GIFs are not supported in Pygame. Someone wrote a module years ago, but it wasn’t reliable for some. You would really need to get under the hood in the ETC os and add that module to the Python build that the ETC runs (NOT the latest version of Python by the way - it runs 2.7.13 I believe). There is no native support for video, but I’ve been toying with adding that module as well. You would need to figure out how to add the moviepy module to Python build as well. That being said, just load discrete animation frames and play those pack sequentially … that should work fine. ---
**Author:** ![oweno](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/forum.critterandguitari.com/oweno/32/10_2.png) [@oweno](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/u/oweno)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 12:26am UTC](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/t/limitations-of-hardware-images-modes/1484/3 "2017-08-01T00:26:20Z")
Your best bet is probably unrolling the gifs into individual images ([image magick](https://www.imagemagick.org/script/index.php) is great for stuff like that) and then cycling through them on the ETC. If the images are small, you should be able to load lots of them. A full frame is 1280 x 720, so loading images into RAM at this size will use up the memory quickly (like 50 or less images). But if your image is 128 x 72, that is 1/100 the size, so you should be able to load many hundreds. ---
**Author:** ![mkunoff](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/forum.critterandguitari.com/mkunoff/32/991_2.png) [@mkunoff](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/u/mkunoff)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 3:14pm UTC](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/t/limitations-of-hardware-images-modes/1484/4 "2017-10-27T15:14:42Z")
Are transparent PNG files supported? ---
**Author:** ![chrisk](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/forum.critterandguitari.com/chrisk/32/11_2.png) [@chrisk](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/u/chrisk)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 3:25pm UTC](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/t/limitations-of-hardware-images-modes/1484/5 "2017-10-27T15:25:21Z")
Yes, you can include PNG files that have transparent parts. ---
**Author:** ![mkunoff](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/forum.critterandguitari.com/mkunoff/32/991_2.png) [@mkunoff](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/u/mkunoff)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 4:19pm UTC](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/t/limitations-of-hardware-images-modes/1484/6 "2017-10-27T16:19:50Z")
Awesome! So, my next question - how about vector formats? SVG? ---
**Author:** ![mkunoff](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/forum.critterandguitari.com/mkunoff/32/991_2.png) [@mkunoff](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/u/mkunoff)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 1:31pm UTC](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/t/limitations-of-hardware-images-modes/1484/7 "2017-10-28T13:31:57Z")
Ah sorry - I realize now I can get some of these answers from pygame documentation. SVG is possible but needs to be rastered first with librsvg. No biggie. SVG isn’t that important to me. I was merely curious about vector images. ---
**Author:** ![chrisk](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/forum.critterandguitari.com/chrisk/32/11_2.png) [@chrisk](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/u/chrisk)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2017, 4:50pm UTC](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/t/limitations-of-hardware-images-modes/1484/8 "2017-11-08T16:50:32Z")
12 posts were split to a new topic: [Using/Changing Fonts used in ETC Modes](https://forum.critterandguitari.com/t/using-changing-fonts-used-in-etc-modes/1958)