The post Save images in an Access database in C# explains how to save images in an Access database. This post explains how to load images from an Access display them.
Like previous examples, this program uses a SQL statement of the form SELECT * FROM Books WHERE... to select a record from the database. It uses the following code to display the image stored in the returned record’s CoverImage field.
Bitmap bm = BytesToImage((byte[])reader["CoverImage"]); picCover.Image = bm;
This code simply fetches the data in the CoverImage field, casts it into an array of bytes, and passes it to the BytesToImage method to convert the bytes into a Bitmap. The following code shows the BytesToImage method.
// Convert a byte array into an image. private Bitmap BytesToImage(byte[] bytes) { using (MemoryStream image_stream = new MemoryStream(bytes)) { Bitmap bm = new Bitmap(image_stream); image_stream.Close(); return bm; } }
This method creates a MemoryStream associated with the byte array. It creates a new Bitmap passing its constructor the MemoryStream, and returns the Bitmap.




Hi Rod,
Although the article focus on loading images from an Access database in C#, the file available for download has the same title as the other article, saving images.
I have not checked the file content.
Yes, these posts explain different aspects of the same program. (There are a few posts like that on C# Helper, although not many.)