This list of Best Free Image Tools for Mac OS:

Image Viewer for Mac OS

Xee

“A lightweight, fast and convenient image viewer and browser, designed to be a serious tool for image viewing and management, with a sleek and powerful interface.

It is useful as a more powerful replacement for Preview, or most any other image viewer available on Mac OS X. It is very fast, and uses less memory than most other image viewing tools.”

Xsee

“An image browser and viewer, developed in Cocoa, with a beautiful Aqua interface. Supporting gif, jpeg, tiff, png, icons and more, full drag and drop interface, built-in tools for renaming files, convert images, create thumbnails. Integrated slide show for viewing images in window or full screen, customizable toolbar, full support for mouse or keyboard navigation and much more.”

Sequential

“Sequential is an image viewer originally designed for opening a folder of images and displaying them in order. It works well for viewing comics and manga.

It can display folders and archives of images (including JPEG, PNG, and GIF) and PDF files, and has mature full screen support and can display images’ Exif data.”

Image Editor for Mac OS

GIMP

“The only freeware package I am aware of that can be called an advanced image editor. It has a steep learning curve but is feature rich, using a multi-windowed interface.”

Seashore

“An open source image editor features gradients, textures and anti-aliasing for both text and brush strokes, supports multiple layers and alpha channel editing.

It is based around the GIMP’s technology and uses the same native file format, but aims to serve the basic image editing needs of most computer users, with an all-new Cocoa UI that will fit right in on Mac OS X.”

High Dynamic Range (HDR) Software for Mac OS

Luminance HDR

“Luminance HDR is the best option if you want to experiment. Nine different tone-mapping algorithms, that means – if you want ‘that’ particular HDR look – there’s a fair chance you’ll achieve it with Luminance HDR. More realistic? Sure. A little like a drawing? Sure. Maybe surrealistic? It’s all here.”

Photo Organizer for Mac OS

XNView

“A small, fast, well featured piece of software—in some ways the most versatile of any. Simple to use and very stable.

It can import more than 300 graphic file formats and export to about 50 formats. Other features include image IPTC, EXIF metadata support, editing facilities, slide shows and support in 44 languages. Excellent.”

Picasa

“A superb choice for those who want an organiser which will take control of the way in which you organise your images. Once installed it will offer you several ways of organising your image collection, adopting by choice a ‘timeline’ which places your most recent images at the top of the tree.

It is ideally suited for easy integration with web albums and on-line sharing of images. Simple highly automated features offer image correction, full-screen slide shows and you can now see your pictures arranged on a global map.”

Vector Graphics Editor for Mac OS

Inkscape

“The application uses W3C standard Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format. Supported SVG features include shapes, paths, text, markers, clones, alpha blending, transforms, gradients, patterns, and grouping. Inkscape also supports Creative Commons meta-data, node editing, layers, complex path operations, bitmap tracing, text-on-path, flowed text, direct XML editing, and more. It imports formats such as JPEG, PNG, TIFF, and others and exports PNG as well as multiple vector-based formats.”

Paint Program for Mac OS

Paintbrush

“Paintbrush is a simple paint program for Mac OS X, reminiscent of Microsoft Paint and Apple’s own now-defunct MacPaint. It provides users with a means to make simple images quickly, something that has been noticeably absent from the Mac for years.”

ArtRage Starter Edition

“An amazing natural paint program that allows users to achieve realistic paint effects without the messy clean-up. It’s a simple-to-use tool with a wonderfully designed user interface that will suit the young adult through the experienced artist.

Even in its limited version, it’s an amazing program. Bottom line is that you can concentrate on your creativity, rather than wrestle with menus.”

CAD Program for Mac OS

Google Sketchup

“You’ll find this program not only a near limitless wealth of capabilities, but also a lucid breezy interface that won’t put your head into a swoon. This is a modestly trimmed-down version of Google’s Sketchup Pro. Yet the free version affords the novice designer a veritable dream come true.

With innovative tools, you can count on achieving your desired results. But it doesn’t stop there. Sketchup incorporates so many advancements that I am hard-pressed to enumerate them. It employs its own scripting language to multiply the software’s power exponentially.” (Review)

Sweet Home 3D

“This software package is sure to tickle every bone in your body. You can model your dream home, along with all of its cherished appointments, and then watch it come to life. You can start simple with just the bare walls or import an image of your intended floor plan to serve as a basis for the design-to-be.

The user interface is as intuitive as it gets; drag and drop furnishings from the built-in catalog onto your floor plan. Clear graphic handles then make it easy to edit the items. Once you’ve finished your home design and tweaked every niche and corner to your liking, the fun has only just begun.”

Blender

“A complete software package for 3D modeling, texturing, rendering, animation and physics. It has a complex but merciful user interface, and the entire repertoire of its capabilities are made available through a scripting language, so the creation of 3D games beckons.

The software can import from and export to more than 20 different file formats. There is a large and growing community of Blender users who’ve already contributed numerous add-on scripts that can make your going easier. If it can be imagined then it can be realized, with Blender freeware.”

Via techsupportalert