TextureView setBackgroundColor not working

Question

I'm trying to just change the background color of a TextureView. I would expect this color to be viewed through a translucent camera view. For some reason this is not the case. If I completely remove the camera’s preview from the onSurfaceTextureAvailable screen, the view remains white (or not visible). Any ideas? I am trying to get a TextureView window that sometimes contains a camera preview, and other times a plain color of my choice. Thanks.

import android.graphics.Color; import android.graphics.SurfaceTexture; import android.hardware.Camera; import android.media.MediaPlayer; import android.os.Bundle; import android.app.Activity; import android.view.Menu; import android.view.Surface; import android.view.TextureView; import android.widget.FrameLayout; import android.widget.RelativeLayout; import java.io.IOException; public class MainActivity extends Activity { private TextureView mTextureView; FrameLayout screenFrame; @Override protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) { super.onCreate(savedInstanceState); setContentView(R.layout.activity_main); screenFrame = (FrameLayout)findViewById(R.id.screenFrame); setVideoScreens(); } @Override public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu) { // Inflate the menu; this adds items to the action bar if it is present. getMenuInflater().inflate(R.menu.main, menu); return true; } private void setVideoScreens() { final LiveCameraActivity livecam = new LiveCameraActivity(); mTextureView = new TextureView(this); mTextureView.setSurfaceTextureListener(livecam); FrameLayout mainFrame = (FrameLayout)findViewById(R.id.mainFrame); mainFrame.addView(mTextureView); int width = 640; int height = 480; mTextureView.setLayoutParams(new FrameLayout.LayoutParams( width, height)); mTextureView.setY(200); mTextureView.setX(200); mTextureView.setBackgroundColor(Color.BLUE); mTextureView.setAlpha(.5f); } public class LiveCameraActivity extends Activity implements TextureView.SurfaceTextureListener { private Camera mCamera; protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) { super.onCreate(savedInstanceState); } public void onSurfaceTextureAvailable(SurfaceTexture surface, int width, int height) { mCamera = Camera.open(); try { mCamera.setPreviewTexture(surface); mCamera.startPreview(); } catch (IOException ioe) { // Something bad happened } } public void onSurfaceTextureSizeChanged(SurfaceTexture surface, int width, int height) { // Ignored, Camera does all the work for us } public boolean onSurfaceTextureDestroyed(SurfaceTexture surface) { mCamera.stopPreview(); mCamera.release(); return true; } public void onSurfaceTextureUpdated(SurfaceTexture surface) { // Invoked every time there a new Camera preview frame } } } 

Answer 1

My solution was to set the opacity to false:

 textureView.setOpaque(false); 

but at the same time, the background color of the TextureView will be irrelevant. So, I put the TextureView inside the FrameLayout and set its background color. When you do this, the FrameLayout background FrameLayout is the color that you see “behind”, or if the TextureView empty.