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Limit Point Software
Icon2Image is a menu bar productivity app for quickly and easily:
- Creating image thumbnails of file, folder and disk icons, in batch, in various image formats and sizes.
- Copying icons to the clipboard (in sizes specified by preferences.)
- Adding custom icons to image, movie or ICNS files.
- Adding custom icons from the images on the clipboard.
- Making ICNS icons of image file contents or movie poster frames.
- Making ICNS icons of file, folder and disk icons.
- Making images from ICNS
What's New
Version 1.3.6
- Icon2Image is now only available as one self contained menu bar app, and the contextual menu and system preference pane have been retired. Minimum system requirement is 10.6.6.
- The preferences have been organized into three panes: Menu, Imaging and Saving accoridng to their functionality. All items have tool tips for help. Some items have been renamed for clarity.
- The background color now has an associated transparency control (alpha.) This value is set from a slider on the "Imaging" pane of the preferences window. "1" is opaque (fully colored) background, and "0" is fully transparent (clear) background. The defualt background color is white.
- Some imaging techniques have been changed for improved results.
- The app now support output of images of icons up to 512x512, rather than 128x128.
- The default output folder is placed in the "icon2Image" folder of the Limit Point Software folder of Application Support, to conform to Apple's rules on using the file system. But, use preference to set the location to any folder you like.
- Management of the various options available in Preferences has been simplified by moving the Preferences pane out of System Preferences and into the menu bar application itself. This simplifies both installation and access of preferences for icon2Image.
- The documentation has not yet beenupdated for these changes to the app, but changes are not so drastic that old documentation, and images, can't be used.
Version 1.3.6
- Icon2Image is now only available as one self contained menu bar app, and the contextual menu and system preference pane have been retired. Minimum system requirement is 10.6.6.
- The preferences have been organized into three panes: Menu, Imaging and Saving accoridng to their functionality. All items have tool tips for help. Some items have been renamed for more...
Requirements
Intel, Mac OS X 10.6.6 or later.
Intel, Mac OS X 10.6.6 or later.
Icon2Image User Discussion (Write a Review)
Overall:
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| Downloads:12,538 |
| Version Downloads:786 |
| Type:Utilities : Icon Tools |
| License:Free |
| Date:01 Jun 2011 |
| Platform:Intel |
| Price:Free |
Overall (Version 1.x):  |
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Icon2Image is a menu bar productivity app for quickly and easily:
- Creating image thumbnails of file, folder and disk icons, in batch, in various image formats and sizes.
- Copying icons to the clipboard (in sizes specified by preferences.)
- Adding custom icons to image, movie or ICNS files.
- Adding custom icons from the images on the clipboard.
- Making ICNS icons of image file contents or movie poster frames.
- Making ICNS icons of file, folder and disk icons.
- Making images from ICNS files.
- Adding icons to web location files using their associated "favicon"
- Removing custom icons from files.
This functionality is available as a menu bar app in the Finder, and operates on multiple file and folder selections at a time, saving you time and effort creating images of icons by other multi-step methods (such as "Get Info" + "Preview" + "Save as" etc.)
Almost all interface elements have tool tips for help learning the app, or recalling what they do.
Preferences
Modify behavior in various ways via Preferences. The preference window includes the following features:
- Include make icons: You have the option to not display menu items to make icons, leaving just the other menu items available. Since making images is the basic feature of the app, it is always available.
- Overwrite files by same name: If a file by the same name already exists this option enables you to prevent Icon2Image from overwriting it.
- Include add custom icon: Option to show the menu items which add custom icons to graphics and movie files (using the movie poster frame.)
- Image ICNS: If this option is selected, and the file is an ICNS file, the image is generated from the ICNS data in the file, rather than the file icon itself.
- Append icon size: If this option is selected, the current icon size will be appended to the name of the generated image files.
- Background image color: You can specify a background image color, using the standard color picker, so that the images blend well with the background they may be placed upon. (The color chooser has a "dropper" tool to copy colors from other parts of the screen.) Click on the color well to open the picker.
Also note that Icon2Image displays the hexadecimal value of the chosen color next to the color well. You can use that to verify the chosen color matches a color you specify in HTML.
- Background transparency: Use the alpha value slider to make a background partially or fully transparent when applying the background color. (Note that only some formats support transparency, but the transparency is applied to the background color even for image formats that do not.)
- Compression: For supported Quicktime Codecs (such as JPEG) you can specify compression quality.
- Image size: Use the slider to specify the output image size. You can choose a size between 16 and 512 pixels on a side. The image size is also used when using the "Copy icon for file" fearure.
- Add custom icon to file. If you select this option Icon2Image will add a custom icon (derived from the graphic image) to the image files it creates.
- Choose image folder. Lets you specify where Icon2image will save files it creates. The default is in the app's folder of Application Support.
- Open image folder for me: Option to open the image folder in the Finder after a file is created and added to it.
- Open image file for me: Lets you specify if Icon2image should open the file after it creates it. The file opens in the default application for files of that type.
Copyright © 2012 MacUpdate LLC
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Jazzyguy reviewed on 01 Jun 2011
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To make turn your icons to images FOR FREE, just copy (cmd + v) your selected icon from the Finder, open up Preview and choose File -> New from Clipboard. You can then save out the icon as any image file that Preview supports. Even supports large 512px icons in Leopard.
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Doug S. reviewed on 10 May 2007
Screenshot Plus for instance can take a screen shot of just an icon. It's free. There are various plugins for Photoshop that can import icon data, including it's various states.
As a piece of software this is indeed nice, but I cannot justify paying $25 for it, not when there are so many other programs that you can get that are more flexible and cost you nothing.
It's just your opinion that this software is 100% useless. Didn't you read the review which preceeds yours? That person, along with many others, don't seem to agree with that. It makes me wonder if you really tried the program or not.
You're comparing software programs which are of different types. The primary advantage of Icon2Image is that it is a contextual menu, not an application. This can simpify your workflow dramatically.
For example. Suppose you want to get a 128x128 image of an application icon. With your method, you probably first have to change the Finder option to view the window with icons sizes set at 128x128. Then you need to launch an application to take a screenshot.Now come some of the problems:
a) Does the screen shot you just took preserve the transparency that resides inside the icns file?
b) Is the screenshot exactly 128x128, or do you have to open it in an image editor to trim it?
c) How easy is it to change the selected output format of the image?
Icon2Image makes this process much easier since it is a contextual menu in the Finder. All you need to do is control-click on the application and make a menu selection - and the image of the icon is generated in whetever format you like, with transparency for image types that support it.
Selecting the image size with Icon2Image is trivial. It's pretty much just another menu selection from the contextual menu.
On top of all this, Icon2Image does more than just generate images from icons. For example, it can add custom icons to image and movie files (using the movies poster frame.) It also works in the opposite direction, i.e. it makes icons from image data.
Finally, if you read the current description of the product on MacUpdate you'll have noticed that IU am offering the program at half-price for a limited time.
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(a) Yes, quite a few of them do. The one I mentioned, ScreenShot Plus, preserves 100% of the icon including alpha, though that program was just one example.
(b) I have to trim away the icon's title, however since we're referring to it's use for designers they're going to be working with photoshop or some other image editing program anyway and clearing a small section of an image takes so little time and effort, there's really not much of a strike against it.
(c) It's right in the settings for the widget, right next to allowing me to choose what it opens to and where it saves to and so forth.
As for the icon's to files, that functionality is built into OS X already. Take any icon resource (creatable by a large number of free graphic editing programs), open it's info window, click the icon and you can copy and paste it into any other info window and it will create all the necessary files for you. If you don't want to do that, there are dozens of other free apps that do it for you.
Also, I mention but one of many apps and the like that can do the job. I mentioned other apps because, though they are not contextual in nature, they may have more features. For instance, I see no mention that if you grab an icon, that it will grab all the other resources associated with it, such as sizes and variates in bit depth and open and closed states.
Again, this is all personal opinion but I can't justify paying for an application I will use relatively rarely when I can get free apps that do it with only a miniscule amount of extra effort.
So, I stand by my review. The features and stability are good (for obvious reasons) usability is alright, though maybe it does warrant a 4th star. Price, however, is still a 1 since I can do this with a variety of other programs. Sorry, but that's just one designers opinion.
For example, you mention that you need to trim off the icon name using one of your tools. This is not necessary with Icon2Image. And what if you wanted to process mulitple icons at once? With Icon2Image you can select multiple items in the Finder and process them all together, i.e. batch process them.
With your free tools, can you rely on technical support and continual updates? Often times you can't (and you did seem surprised I came back with a response so soon, indicative of my constant attention to what I am doing.)
I consider Icon2Image one of my best programs, and if you browse my website, http://www.limit-point.com, you'll see I've written quite a few programs. So there's no doubt I will continue to provide updates to it. I use it all the time.
But, if you review the history of comments here on MacUpdate you'll notice, and it's quite funny, that almost every update I post ellicits a comment or review like yours, i.e. sort of acknowledging or hinting the product is good, but you want it for free, and the pricing is the most outrageous thing you've seen. So you'll write a comment pointing out supposed alternatives, which usually turn out to be a vatsly different entities than what is described, or unsupported tools that haven't been updated for 5 years or so. It's crazy.
Please note, however, I always offer updates for free, for all my software.
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This coming from someone who develops and designs. I don't expect to be paid the same thing for processing an image as I do for making a Flash slideshow.
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My comment concerns the dev mentioning 'the review which preceeds yours' by way of showing that there are people who really dig this app and happily pay for it. BUT the writer of 'the review which preceeds yours' has paid $5 for the app and not the now charged $25. Whereas $5 seems reasonable, $25 appears less so.
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Bof.
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If you like the features of the program you can register it for $5.
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Anonymous reviewed on 26 Oct 2005
It's free and it does the same thing.
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This simplifies workflow since it's conveniently available and conversions between icons and images is performed usually in just one step or two. Then it's out of your way.
I've been checking out the alternative (yes, free) products, and most of them don't seem to be contextual menus. I think these tasks are perfect for a contextual menu - and that's why I work on it.
Did you try it before you wrote your anonymous comment?
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Good program.
Mac DVD Ripper|Mac Video Converter
Anonymous reviewed on 30 Sep 2005
Even if the feature set is identical, Icon2Image is different because it provides all its functionality conveniently from a lightweight contextual menu in the Finder, and not as an application.
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Anonymous reviewed on 27 Sep 2005
http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/9477
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There is also Iconverter (http://macupdate.com/info.php/id/9477), but it's non a contextual menu... but it's free, but 5 bucks, it's not that much... Ho I don't know ! too much choices lol :P