Put a bitmap on top of StaticBitmap in WxPython

Question

I have an application that has a panel on which static bitmaps (wx.StaticBitmap) are placed in a GridBagSizer. I want to place a bitmap on top of certain of the static bitmaps, that will partly cover it and its neighbours.

I've been trying like this:

self.panel = wx.Panel(self, -1, style=wx.TRANSPARENT_WINDOW)
self.panel.Bind(wx.EVT_PAINT, self.place_bitmap)

.
.
.

def place_bitmap(self, *args):
    dc = wx.ClientDC(self.panel)  # or wx.PaintDC(self.panel)

    for xy in self.coordinates:
        dc.DrawBitmap(self.top_bitmap, xy[0], xy[1], 0)

    self.panel.Layout()

If I change the coordinates in dc.DrawBitmap() to a place in self.panel where there is no static bitmap, it shows. But I can't get it to show on top of the static bitmaps. So it seems it's getting rendered under them?

How can I make the top_bitmap go on top?

Answer 1

You can't draw on top of the child windows portably. The general solution is to create a child window of that child window and draw on it but in your case it probably would be simpler to just use a custom window instead of wxStaticBitmap which is a trivially simple class anyhow -- then you'd be able to draw whatever you want in it.