873 One of my quests since beginning my OS X Odyssey has been to find an OS X native image editing application that I like as well or at least lamost as well as my venerable and beloved Color It! 4.1, which I have continued to use in Classic Mode. An OS X version of Color It! has been promised, but as yet it's vaporware. Many have suggested Graphic Converter, which I've been familiar with since Systam 7 versions, but GC, while a powerful and impressive program, has never really appealed to me as a substitute for Color It! for the sort of stuff I do with graphics, especially compared with Color It's virtually instant startup (if Classic Mode is already running), and lightning speed -- to be expected I guess with an application that works reasonably well on a 68020 Mac.

I have Adobe Photoshop Elements 2.0, which is certainly powerful enough, but it's interface is clunky and it's soooooo slowwww! Other OS X native image editing software I've tried have likewise been either too slow, too bloated, or too feature-challenged for my tastes. I keep coming back to good 'ol Color It!

However, someday I would like to be able to say goodbye to Classic Mode at least for routine use, so I'm still hoping for that OS X port of Color It!, but also keep an eye out for potential Color It! replacements. One that fills the gap substantially is ToyViewer. ToyViewer is a tricky program to categorize. It's more than a graphics viewer, but less than a full - fledged image editing application, incorporating elements of both.

I wasn't expecting a lot from ToyViewer, which is freeware and its name doesn't exactly elicit confidence, butToyViewer has suprised me. This program ain't no toy. It's actually an amazingly capable image editor, and it's become one of those "can't do without it" factotum applications. For resizing and converting images, which are the two most common tasks I do with graphics, ToyViewer is even faster and slicker than Color It! Indeed, if just cut & paste editing were added, ToyViewer would serve about 90% of my graphics utility needs admirably.

ToyViewer was developed originally on NeXTstep and then OPENSTEP. Currently it is for Mac OS X (Cocoa). ToyViewer has an impressive array of simple image editing functions, and also offers filter services to other applications. If ToyViewer is installed in your Mac, you can see image files in PCX, PPM, Sun Raster, etc. on other Cocoa applications. It also supports the more popular image formats, and with the latest version 4.52 release finally supports saves to GIF format without the need of a third-party plugin.

However, unfortunately all is not well with the ToyViewer 4.5x versions, which are recommended for users running OS 10.3 Panther. As I noted, resizing graphics -- mostly screenshots -- is one of the main tasks I utilize ToyViewer for, and with the 4.5x builds, image quality in reduced images has deteriorated significantly.

Here is a PICT screenshot to clipboard image reduced to 60% using ToyViewer 4.43

And here is the same image at similar reduction using ToyViewer 4.52

I also tried reducing a PDF regular screenshot with version 4.52 and got similarly crummy results.

Consequently, I have continued to use ToyViewer 4.43 (which is still available for download) for production work, even though I'm using Panther. The diminishment in image quality with the later versions is unsatisfactory. I hope that the issue will be addressed in a later release. Versions earlier than 4.5 are claimed to have a save panel bug if they run on Panther, but I haven't encountered any difficulty in a lot of inten sive use.

ToyViewer Features:

1. ToyViewer can read and display image files in following formats:

tiff, gif, bmp, png, jpg, bie(jbig), pcx, pcd, pict, pnm (ppm, pbm, or pgm), xbm, mag, SUN Rasterfile, JPEG2000(jp2, jpc, j2k), and other formats supported by Mac OS X.

2. Displayed images can be saved in following formats:

tiff, pdf, gif, bmp, png, jpg, jpeg2000, bie(jbig), pnm, or xbm.

3. ToyViewer can attach a custom icon to any file as well as newly saved image file.

4. ToyViewer can read and write gif or png files with transparent color, and also can read and write interlaced(progressive) gif, png, or jpg files.

5. ToyViewer can scan (auto-display) image files in a folder. You can also display images in full-screen size.

6. Displayed images can be scaled (enlarge/shrink).

7. You can rotate, flip, or clip images.

8. ToyViewer has ability to adjust brightness, contrast, color tone of images, and has some typical operations to images, such as enhancement, embossing, and so on.

9. You can replace specified color with other color or transparent color.

10. Full color images can be reduced into 256, 64, or 8 colors. Also, each color value of images can be cut down to 4, 2, or 1 bit.

11. ToyViewer can make images monochrome (8bit gray, 2bit gray, or bilevel).

12. Images can be printed.

13. You can set ToyViewer to display any image format if there is a filter program to ppm format.

14. ToyViewer provides image conversion filter services for other applications.

15. You can add comments to images (comments are written into only gif, png, jpg, or pnm formats).

16. You can make Aqua-button-like images.

17. If you like a displayed image, you can make it the Desktop picture (wallpaper) of your Mac.

18. ToyViewer also has a "Wallpaper" feature with which you can make optimize an image for use as a Desktop picture (wallpaper) for your Mac. You can also hide windows of other applications to look at the wallpaper.

New in this version:
• Version 4.50 is for Mac OS X 10.3.x (Panther). Earlier versions have a trouble on save panel if they run on Panther. Ver. 4.50 does not have this trouble, but it cannot run on 10.1.x or 10.2.x instead.
• Semitransparent colors in PNG images are read, written, and displayed correctly. (Preview cannot keep right color, on the contrary.) Besides, in some operations, semitransparent colors are dealt correctly.
Note that image formats in which semitransparent colors are saved are only PNG or TIFF.
• You can make custom icons with transparent/semitransparent colors.
• Operations for ''Transparency'' are added. You can add/remove (semi-)transparent color to/from images.
• "Shuffle" button is placed on the panel for scan a directory. Checking the button, you can see in random order images in the directory.
• Aqua-button-like "Soft Frame" is improved.
• "Hide All Windows" item is removed from the Dock Menu, because Expose has the same function. Instead, "Open from Pasteboard" item is added.

Perhaps the developer, Takeshi Ogihara, has no interest in turning ToyViewer into a full-zoot bitmap "paint" program, but what's already there is so good that it's tantalizing to think how cool it would be if a set of MacPaint style editing tools and functions were added. I encourage Mr. Ogihara to give it some serious thought.

New in this version:
• You can save images in GIF format without any additional setting.
• When you select "Open from Pasteboard" of the Dock Menu, ToyViewer is activated.

System requirements:
• Mac OS X 10.3 or higher (vers. 4.43 still available for OS 10.2)

ToyViewer is freeware

For more information, visit:
http://waltz.cs.kobe-u.ac.jp/OSX/toyv-eng.html

You can read the ToyViewer manual here:
http://waltz.cs.kobe-u.ac.jp/OSX/toyv-help/English.lproj/index.html

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