Rendering animated GIFS with D2D question

[ahcfan]

Is it more efficient to convert all IWICBitmapFrameDecode frames to an array of ID2D1Bitmaps when the image is loaded, or use one ID2D1Bitmap and convert the frames on the fly? It's not clear to me whether bitmaps share the same pixel data as the image frame or if pixels are copied to the bitmap.

[ahcfan]

Is anyone familiar with these APIs? I get overwhelmed by the amount of COM objects I have to juggle to render an image:

IWICImagingFactory
IWICBitmapDecoder
IWICBitmapFrameDecode
IWICFormatConverter
IWICMetadataQueryReader
ID2D1Factory
ID2D1RenderTarget
ID2D1Bitmap

My goal is to encapsulate an image in such a way that it can be easily rendered to a window. Looking for advice.