One of the new libraries I've not blogged about enough (cough... at all... cough) is one that will help the C++ or C# dev create GPU accelerated 2D Windows Runtime apps on Windows 8.1/WinPhone 8.1 and Windows 10.

Why haven't I blogged about it? Well, I hate the author... JUST KIDDING. No, I've not blogged about it because it wasn't done yet and Windows 10 hadn't been released (GA/RTW/Gold/you know).

I'm talking about Win2D and wait is over as Shawn Hargreaves announced a couple weeks ago...

What is this Win2D?

Want to see how to build apps with it? See if in action?

Shortly before releasing Win2D version 1, the team downed tools and spent a week writing our own apps to validate Win2D end-to-end. For better or worse, the results are available on github... Harrydactyl: Cooper's silly game with dinosaurs https://github.com/coopp/Harry Fly a Pterodactyl named Harry across a world filled with dinosaurs and collect as many coins as you can! This game uses a simple FlappyBird-like flight mechanic with a point based coin pickup system. Interesting features: Shared projects and code between Windows 8.1, Windows Phone 8.1 and Windows 10

Game state management

Parallax scrolling backgrounds

Animated sprites

Day to night transitioning sky ... Age and Gender Guesser https://github.com/austinkinross/age-gender-guesser Use this to find out somebody's age and gender! Simply take a photograph using your Windows 10 device's camera, and for each person in the photograph the app will guess their age and gender and draw it above their face. It is very similar to www.how-old.net. This is a Windows 10 application written for the Universal Windows Platform. It uses the Project Oxford API for face recognition and age/gender guessing. It uses Win2D for its graphics rendering. It makes use of the new camera video effects added to Windows 10, and the interop available between the camera and Win2D. ... Rubik’s Cube Solver (work-in-progress) https://github.com/austinkinross/rubiks-cube-solver Let this app solve a Rubik’s Cube for you! Hold it up to your device’s camera, and this app will analyze the colors and solve a virtual model of it on your screen. The app is work-in-progress. Win2D and the new camera effects in Windows 10 were used to find the Rubik’s Cube in the camera feed (in realtime) and detect the colors. ... Shawn's Terrific Universal App for photogRaph Tweaking https://github.com/shawnhar/stuart This is a simple, powerful, and contrivedly acronymed Windows 10 photo editing app. Features: Use a rich set of image effects to tweak your photos

Apply effects to the whole image or just selected parts of it

Feather selected regions for smooth transitions ...

A little more on Stuart;

Stuart: Shawn's Terrific Universal App for photogRaph Tweaking Stuart is a contrivedly acronymed Windows 10 photo editing app which I wrote during a recent Win2D app building exercise. I’m posting it here because I’m pleased with how it turned out. XAML + Win2D makes it really easy to do this sort of thing! Where to get it Download from the Store

Or clone the source from github Features Use a rich set of image effects to tweak your photos

Apply effects to the whole image or just selected parts of it

Feather selected regions for smooth transitions

Runs on Windows 10 PCs and phones ...

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