How to merge images in PHP? - php

Question

I have two images which are loaded from an external URL. I want to place one image on top of another (keeping the size). I actually don't know the sizes of the images as they are from an external URL and are different each time.
So I want a function which can be called like merge($url1,$url2,$final_name). I have googled on this but none worked.
I want this 3.png :
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
|
IMAGE 1 |
|
|
___________________________________________________________________________
|
IMAGE 2 |
|
|
___________________________________________________________________________
$top_file = 'image1.png';
$bottom_file = 'image2.png';
$top = imagecreatefrompng($top_file);
$bottom = imagecreatefrompng($bottom_file);
// get current width/height
list($top_width, $top_height) = getimagesize($top_file);
list($bottom_width, $bottom_height) = getimagesize($bottom_file);
// compute new width/height
$new_width = ($top_width > $bottom_width) ? $top_width : $bottom_width;
$new_height = $top_height + $bottom_height;
// create new image and merge
$new = imagecreate($new_width, $new_height);
imagecopy($new, $top, 0, 0, 0, 0, $top_width, $top_height);
imagecopy($new, $bottom, 0, $top_height+1, 0, 0, $bottom_width, $bottom_height);
// save to file
imagepng($new, 'merged_image.png');
This does the job but the merged image loses its color and becomes nearly black and white like this:

Answer 1

Instead of this:
// create new image and merge
$new = imagecreate($new_width, $new_height);
I used:
// create new image and merge
$new = imagecreatetruecolor($new_width, $new_height);
It worked!
Thanks!

Answer 2

i looked up ur code but i would save the folder in something like that:
$time = date('d-M-Y') . '-TIME-' . date('H-i-s');
$save_finalimage_socialmedia = public_path("storage/image-{$time}.jpeg");
imagejpeg($new, $save_finalimage_socialmedia);
PS: i did it in the jpeg format, so if you want, you can change in ur format (png,jpg,...)
PS: #user4273356 ur code worked for me