I've been using GraphicConverter for as long as I can remember. If you cannot afford Adobe Photoshop then this is the application for you. And after using it you may wonder what you need Photoshop for anyway. I use both GC and PS together. There are some rock solid features for both. For instance: I think I've downloaded a picture from the web fully (at least my download manager in IE says it's complete), but actually a few bits weren't gotten. Photoshop will refuse to open it saying it couldn't parse the pic. No worries. GraphicConverter will open it.
With the newest X version I'm even happy with the new toolbar icons. Rather than the bland and boring black and white 2D graphics they've replaced them with some nice 3D aquaesque graphics as shown to the right.
Also, GC supports more file formats than even PS does: .D, 8BIM (old Photoshop 2.0 format), Acorn Sprite, AFP, ALIAS, AMBER ARR, ANI, ANPA, Apple Preferred, ART, ASCII, BioRad, BLD, BMP, BUF, BUM, CAM, CALS, CEL, CGM, System 7 clip, CLP, CT, CVG, DCX, DESR VFF, DICoM, DJ1000, DL, Doodle, DPX, Dr. Halo, ElectronicImage, EPS/EPSF*, ESM, FAX, FaxSTF, FireViewer PDB, FITS, FLH/FLI/FLC, FPX**, FUJI, GATAN, GEM, GFX, GIF, GRP, HAM, HP-GL/2, IBM ¨¢ PIC, IC ? ¨¢ Imagic, ICo/ICN, IFF/LBM, Image ->Finder, ImageLab/PrintTechnic, IMG/XIMG, IMQ, IPLab, ISS, j6i, JBI, JIF, JPEG/JFIF, Additional EXIF information (from digital cameras) is supported, JPEG 2000***, KDC****, KISS CEL, Koala, KoNTRoN, Lotus-PIC, LWF, MacPaint, MAG, MAYA-IFF, MBM, Meteosat 5, Moov, MSP,MSX ¨¢ MSX2, MSX+ - MSX2+, NE, NGG/NCG, NIF, NoL, oNCoR, P ? ? ¨¢ Degas, Palette, PAC ¨¢ STAD, PBM/PGM/PPM, PCD, PCX, PIC (32K), PIC, PICS, PICT, PICT resource, PDB, PGC/PGF, PM, PNG, PoRST, Ppat, PSD, QDV, QNT, QTIF, and many, many, more.
This was initially intended to be a review of version 4.5.6, but the day I started writing the review v4.6 was released. They have added a cool new feature to it. The stamp tool.
Now not only can people on a budget do great things digitally at a great cost, but they can do it almost as if they were using Photoshop itself. This is a must have for anyone who cannot afford Photoshop, has file formats not supported by it, or has pesky download problems as above.
I would have given GC a 5+ rating but it lost some points due to one major flaw... It still needs a helper application to handle EPS files. After all this time you would think that the developers would have figured out how to handle EPS vector graphics without help from another app. Besides that one small point this is truly an application every Mac user should have in their library.
UPDATE: FINALLY!! With version 5.1.1 there is now EPS support (OSX 10.3.5 and above only) which is a relief. Because of this GC's rating moves from 4 apples to 5+ apples.
I've been using GraphicConverter for as long as I can remember. If you cannot afford Adobe Photoshop then this is the application for you. And after using it you may wonder what you need Photoshop for anyway. I use both GC and PS together. There are some rock solid features for both. For instance: I think I've downloaded a picture from the web fully (at least my download manager in IE says it's complete), but actually a few bits weren't gotten. Photoshop will refuse to open it saying it couldn't parse the pic. No worries. GraphicConverter will open it.