Java 2D graphics performance questions

1) Is their any performance loss when making a new image with bitmask transparency, drawing just a few things on it then drawing it on top of another; versus drawing the same image in the same conditions, but with the background cleared to an opaque color ?

2) What is the importance of the performance loss when drawing multiple images versus drawing one big image that includes them all ?

3) Is it better to draw small bit of images from a big image (a sprite sheet) or from their individual image ? Note I'm speaking about memory images, their representation on disk 开发者_如何学JAVAdoesn't matter.

There are a lot of unknown parameters here:

• What is the underlying OS
• What is the JVM vendor/version
• How much memory is available on the video card
• How big is the image
• Is the image hardware accelerated

The only practical way to answer your questions is to run benchmarks.