8.7. Using the Image and BitmapImage Controls

The Flex SDK presents images with the MX Image and the Spark BitmapImage control. The MX Image control can be used to present images that are downloaded from a server at runtime, loaded from the local hard disk at runtime (for AIR applications only, because Web applications don't have access to the local file system), or embedded in the Flex application. The Spark BitmapImage control, which is implemented as a primitive class (rather than as a component), supports embedding of images but is not able to download images from the Web or load images from the local file system at runtime.

The Image and BitmapImage controls can be declared in either MXML or ActionScript. You determine which image is presented with the source property.