Introduction
Years later, facing a kaleidoscope of vibrant images, one might recall that distant afternoon when their father took them to a photo studio.
Why Develop Picview? What Problems Does It Solve?
Years later, when switching to a Mac, they were overwhelmed by countless images. The default Preview app was simply not designed for dedicated image browsing. The scroll wheel couldn’t zoom, arrow keys couldn’t flip through images, and folders couldn’t be browsed comprehensively. It seemed like fate had tasked them with creating their own image viewer. After three months of development, the basic features were completed. A year of dedicated iteration later, the app was polished enough to introduce to you—Picview.
Key Features
Overall, Picview is compact, elegant, and offers smooth image viewing. The installer is only 7.9 MB, uses minimal memory, and provides extensive customization options and layout choices. Below is a breakdown of its features.
1. Click-to-View
With Picview, you can double-click an image in Finder to open it, use the left/right arrow keys to flip through images, zoom with the mouse scroll wheel, and close with the Esc key—very reminiscent of Windows. It also supports gesture controls, such as two-finger swiping to flip images, pinch-to-zoom, and customizable shortcuts.
2. Immersive Viewing
In Picview’s image viewer, thumbnails can stick to the left side of the window or be fixed at the bottom. The toolbar can appear at the bottom or blend into the title bar. There’s always a layout you’ll love. Moreover, Picview emphasizes the image itself by automatically hiding the title bar and toolbar until needed, enabling truly borderless image viewing.
3. Multi-Mode Browsing
In Picview, you can choose a single-window mode where each new image replaces the previous one or a multi-window mode where each image opens in a separate window. You can even pin an image directly to your desktop, resize and adjust its transparency freely. Picview also offers ten image scaling modes, including showcase mode (where the window is fixed and the image scales) and frameless mode (where the window is hidden, highlighting the image).
4. Folder Navigation
With Picview, opening one image in a folder allows you to browse all images in that folder. You can sort images by capture time or size and filter them by extension. It supports a wide range of image formats, including quick loading of RAW files, and displays photo metadata such as ISO, exposure time, and aperture.
5. OCR Text Recognition
Leveraging Apple’s system-level AI technology, Picview provides offline text recognition on images. This allows you to select and copy text directly from images and even isolate the main object in an image. This functionality is rare among third-party Apple apps.
Conclusion
The journey ahead is still long. I will continue to enhance Picview with features like image starring, cropping, and editing. Grid and waterfall views are also under consideration. If you have ideas for improving image viewing, leave a comment below. You can find Picview on the Mac App Store by searching for it—it’s free to download and use. Life is fleeting, but the moments we capture endure. Thank you for watching, and don’t forget to like, follow, and share. See you next time!