When it comes to creating complex eye-catching graphics, usually you need graphic design skills that are beyond the means of most mere mortals.

Toolbox allows you to to construct some amazingly impressive graphics using "building blocks" rather than paint brushes or spray cans. Toolbox is not like conventional image editing apps and it takes sometime to get your head around the way it works. In saying that, if you're used advanced applications like Photoshop, then Toolbox will seem pretty basic and will be fairly easy to pick up.

It's very hard to describe exactly how Toolbox works if you haven't worked with a building block design app before but it basically involves selecting pre-defined parameters and then putting them together in a creative way. However, it can't be denied that it's very frustrating not have access to a brush or simply retouch other images.

Toolbox is an innovative and unique design application but at 50 dollars to purchase to the full version, you'll probably only upgrade if you really love the building block design principle.

Download Toolbox 0.8.1 in Softonic

Feel like cropping pictures? iZoom gets the job done. This little application lets you adjust a photo and focus on a specific area, to then crop out what you don't want.

iZoom comes with almost a dozen preset sizes, which for most people will be just what they need. These go from iPod Photo to thumbnail, desktop background or email portrait. Select one of the presets, load in your photo and adjust it. All you then need to do is crop.

You can also create your own custom cropping profile thanks to the size and quality tools at the bottom left.

These, and that is my general gripe with the program, are fairly limited. iZoom lets you crop photos but nothing more. The editing features are restricted and there aren't any more settings you can play on.

The applications is slightly limited, yet iZoom makes for a quick cropping tool.

Download iZoom in Softonic

ChocoFlop is a CoreImage-based, realtime, non-destructive, high dynamic range image and photo editing application for Mac OS X. It supports a wide range of formats, offers many filters and blending modes and does with many geometry and painting tools.

Download ChocoFlop 0.87 in Softonic

Most designers probably know already about the wonders of Adobe Illustrator; if you don’t, welcome to one of the best vector drawing tools in the world.

As with any other Adobe tool, Illustrator feels really complex for first-time users: lots of windows and palettes, toolbars full of unknown icons, many new functions and features to learn… Luckily the program includes a bunch of templates to get you started, as well as a thorough help section where you'll find the answer to all your doubts and problems.

Once you get the knack of it, you'll start realizing just how powerful and versatile Adobe Illustrator can be. Your creativity will be boosted with Illustrator's impressive set of drawing tools, brushes, color processing tools and gradient effects, not to mention the wide array of filters and special effects with which you can add the final touch to your drawing.

Adobe Illustrator is seamlessly integrated with other Adobe tools (like Adobe Bridge), something that makes your work more comfortable and easier if you're already used to working with Adobe apps.

Adobe Illustrator is the reference tool when it comes to vector designing and drawing. It features an impressive set of tools, filters and effects and is perfectly integrated with other Adobe apps.

Download Adobe Illustrator CS3 13.0.3 in Softonic

Intaglio is a traditional Macintosh drawing & illustration application exclusively for Mac OS X. Patterned after the original Macintosh drawing applications, Intaglio is intuitive to beginners and familiar to traditional Macintosh users.

Intaglio builds on the 2D graphics, text, color, and scripting capabilities of Mac OS X to provide unprecedented power and flexibility in an inexpensive drawing program that is an ideal tool for beginners and experienced graphics experts alike.

Download Intaglio 2.9.8 in Softonic

ImageWell is the popular image editing software for quick manipulation and upload to an iDisk (.mac account), FTP server or other web server. Whether you are adding images to your documents, editing offline images, or posting photos to the web for others to see, ImageWell will do the work for you.

Drag images in and out of the well, resize, crop, shape, rotate and add a watermark, border, or drop shadow. No need to launch multiple applications to add text, labels, arrows, circles and squares to your image. Add a thought cloud or talking balloon. A few simple clicks, copy, paste, and send them off to your web server instantly. At the click of a button the image is sent and a handy URL is copied to the clipboard.

Don't want to send the image to the web? You don't have to, it's not the law. Edit your image, give it a name and file type, and simply drag and drop the image to the desired destination on your computer to save it there. Or drag and drop it into another document or presentation.

Download ImageWell 3.5.3 in Softonic

With Graphic Inspector you can check a batch of graphics for problems in seconds.

Whether you're a photographer, a graphics designer or just anyone who needs to work with a large library of graphics, you might need to quickly search for a specific attribute or error. Instead of doing this file by file, which could be really tedious, you can instead use Graphic Inspector.

The application check through files quickly and displays all detailed information, such as color mode, resolution or spot colors. You can even view EXIF data, which are recorded by your camera, in a side window.

Graphic Inspector can check up presets and quickly find graphics that share a similar attribute. It will flag all files concerned so you can check them later.

After correcting the graphics that the application detected you can quickly rescan them and make sure that the changes have been well implemented. Just look at the information via Graphic Inspector.

On the whole, Graphic Inspector is a good application that will allow you to check for problems in a large batch of graphics. It could be a little less expensive though.

Download Graphic Inspector 1.5 in Softonic

A simple, yet effective image editor, LiveQuartz sports a very nice window layout, which gives you easy access to layers and filters, whilst offering you other editing options. Use the top menu bar to draw lines, add text or shapes. From the left of the interface you can add and preview as many layers as you want. The right is reserved for filters, and LiveQuartz offers an impressive amount of them. You can easily add as many as you need and remove them in a click.

LiveQuartz seems to focus more on filters and layers at the expense of other editing tools. These are pretty limited and will only carry out basic functions. We also found that the layer controls, , because of their size, can be a bit difficult to manipulate.

LiveQuartz is a nice free image editor, especially if you're interested in filters and layers, but don't count on it to extensively edit images.

Download LiveQuartz Image Editor 1.8.1 in Softonic

Working with RAW files enables you to tweak small adjustments in your photos before converting them into their definitive format. In a way it feels like working in a photo laboratory.

Now you can have this lab on your own Mac. Download Raw Photo Processor and you'll be able to work on your RAW files directly, adjusting their brightness, contrast, color balance, exposition, saturation, interpolation and other values. The whole process is really easy: simply move the slides with your mouse until you achieve the desired result, which the program shows in real time.

The only drawback to Raw Photo Processor is that it doesn't import RAW images from your camera, so you'll need to do that on your own before optimizing them with this program.

Raw Photo Processor enables you to work directly on your RAW files and easily optimize them before saving them to their final format.

Download Raw Photo Processor 3.7.5 in Softonic

Do you hate having to open up Photoshop just to design an icon? Gluestick is a small graphics editor that web designers will find extremely useful to prepare interface and icon designs.

The application lets you add two types of layers, text and image, and features a complete template set of Apple icons to work with ranging from accounts to alerts or folders. Open up the inspector window to set options like position, size, color, shadow and zoom. Your layers can be resized and Gluestick lets you really zoom in onto your picture so you can edit the details.

Although Gluestick offers many editing tools, I wouldn't consider it a proper graphics editor like Pixelmator though. The inclusion of icon templates and the fact that images are handled via layers makes it really ideal for designing interfaces and icons for Mac. The fact that it renders in CoreAnimation also ensure that your images look even crisper on a Mac desktop.

Gluestick will come in handy when creating icons and interfaces for Mac.

Download Gluestick 1.0.3 in Softonic

The Gimp is the open source reference in image manipulation. This free application will allow you to retouch, author and edit your photos thanks to a wide set of tools.

Let’s quickly go through what you can do with the Gimp. The painting function has the essential clone, airbrush or pencil tools and a powerful gradient and blend tool. You can also create and save your own brushes and patterns for later use. The program lets you manipulate your photos, adding layers, doing Bezier and polygonal selections or setting text. Load and save animations in a frame-as-layer format and batch process all your photos for quick editing. The multi-windowed interface can be moved around to fit your needs and resized according to your desktop space.

What’s more, the Gimp can be expanded with over 100 different plug-ins and extensions available on the Gimp’s website. These apply in majority for layer effects such as render, distort or blur and make a great addition to the ones already present in the program.

While the Gimp is user friendly, the installation process can result a bit hairy. Because the application works under the GTK Runtime Environment, you will have to install this kit to successfully launch the program. The process is fairly lengthy and some error messages tend to pop up, however if you persist, you will be able to install the Gimp properly on your PC

Despite this fairly hazardous installation process, the Gimp is a program we recommend. Whether you’re out of dough or are looking for a free alternative to Photoshop, the Gimp is excellent image manipulation software with all the tools you’d expect. The friendly interface and expandability make this a program of choice.

Download The GIMP 2.2.11 in Softonic

One thing I like in Flickr is being able to add labels in your pictures, to highlight certain details. Although you can't really do that in iPhoto on your Mac, you can use an application like PhotoNotes.

You start out by importing the photos you want to label, either from your Finder or by dragging and dropping them from iPhoto. The program will divide photos into those with comments and those without. To add labels to a photo all you need to do is double click on one, then drag on any section you want to label. PhotoNotes will let you add names from your Address Book or any sort of content.

The application will also allow you to export images as html so you can share them on the net.

PhotoNotes made adding labels very easy, however I was a little annoyed having to once again import pictures from another source just for this. It would also have been nice to have more customization features for the labels, like font or color.

You'll enjoy PhotoNotes if you want to quickly add labels to your photos and aren't annoyed by having to import your pics into yet another program.

Download PhotoNotes 1.0 in Softonic

Mixing and matching colours is safer with ColorTheory. This application will tell you in real time, which colour matches the one you choose from a gradient scale. You can see different types of match by selecting various types of formula. There are lots of combinations or better, relations between colours available, from the classic ‘Primaries’, ‘Complementary’, ‘Tertiaries’ to more complex relations like ‘Six Tone Chord CCW’ or ‘Pastels’ or ‘Clash’.

When you have chosen one, move the corners of the triangle or rectangal you find over the gradient scale of colours. This allows you, while moving the angle, to see all the possible shades with the relation of colours you have chosen before. This software works with the RYB (red, yellow and blue) model of colours which is the one used in most professional art. The RGB model is the one computers and photo-editor use, so that’s why it can be useful to have this program to see the colour combinations in the standard chromatic convention.

Whether you are a fabric designer, an artist or a web designer, see the matching colours that follow standard relations in a click with ColorTheory.

Download ColorTheory 1.6 in Softonic

I've always wondered how Mac developers manage to make such nice looking interfaces and icons for their programs. A tool like Opacity makes this accessible to literally anyone.

Opacity is some sort of niche graphics editor. Limited to three graphics areas (applications, icons and the web) it offers the traditional pens, colors and zoom tools. You can use some of the templates to get working right away or start from scratch by selecting one of the different shapes and create your own interfaces, buttons and more.

Apart from layers and filters we were surprised to see a few other tools a little bit out of the ordinary. Math Anywhere lets you enter a basic equation anywhere and Goodies lets you easily improve your graphics. Opacity also includes vectors, variables and frames to achieve just the results you want.

At times though, Opacity feels a little rudimentary, and more experienced users might simply prefer working with a more advanced solution with many more tools and effects.

Opacity is a good application to edit all your graphics in applications, web sites and icons. A simple and accessible option

Download Opacity 1.1 in Softonic

Photoshop might dominate the image editing market but there are other excellent alternatives like Acorn, Pixelmator or specifically Drawit.

The application has a clean interface yet is filled with features, so be ready to spend a bit of time to fully master it. The image editor offers from classic editing features like magic wand, fill or brush to more advanced elements like layers or non-destructive effects. Groups, text formatting, blending and masks are also really well handled by the program. That said, Drawit's standout features have got to be vector drawing and bitmap tools though.

However, Drawit Lite won't offer support for plugins, CoreImage filters and layers, advanced functions like copying or pasting effects or the slice tool, that you all get in the Pro version. We'd recommended trying out the Lite version, and if you really enjoy, then switching to the Pro version.

Drawit Lite is an excellent alternative image editor, with a wealth of powerful features and tools to work with. It's significantly more limited than the Pro version though.

Download DrawIt Lite 3.5 in Softonic

Photoshop might dominate the image editing market but there are other excellent alternatives like Acorn, Pixelmator or specifically Drawit.

The application has a clean interface yet is filled with features, so be ready to spend a bit of time to fully master it. The image editor offers from classic editing features like magic wand, fill or brush to more advanced elements like layers or effects. We quite liked how you could tag these in the bottom right of the interface for quick access. Groups, text formatting, blending and masks are also really well handled by the program. That said, Drawit's standout features have got to be vector drawing and bitmap tools though.

If you want to add your own touch to your image, you'll be glad to learn that Drawit supports many plugins, CoreImage filters and layers. You can export images as icons or choose from a number of widely used image formats.

Drawit is an excellent alternative image editor, with a wealth of powerful features and tools to work with. If you take the time to learn how to use it, you won't be disappointed.

Download DrawIt Pro 3.5 in Softonic

Who says you absolutely need Photoshop when editing images? PhotoLine is just another example that solid alternatives photo editing tools do exist.

The application loads very fast compared to Photoshop, and offers a very similar interface, with most of your tools placed on the left. You'll get access to a wide range of layers, effects and filters from the menu bar and various viewing modes. The program also lets you easily create HDR images and offers full masking support.

Photoline includes a web tab, from which you can create animations, buttons or images. In 'web export' you'll be able to add last second touches and actions such as converting to grey or brightening shadows.

A solid image editor needs to be able to save to many formats, which PhotoLine does. You can choose from over 20 different types including Macintosh icon and AVI.

To be honest though, we'd have to say that PhotoLine compares best with Photoshop Elements, simply because it doesn't have as many features as the complete Photoshop.

In all though, PhotoLine remains an excellent image editing application with many tools and effects to get the most out of your pictures.

Download PhotoLine 32 14.51 in Softonic

Plasq makes it easy and fun to learn how to draw in a beautiful, full screen interface.

Paintbrush for Mac is generally considered the standard paint application for Mac, yet it might just have found a more than valid heir. Doozla offers you all the tools to draw up sketches and color up drawings, this in a beautiful, full screen interface.

You get four choices to work with: an image, an iSight photo snap, a color-in image or a blank page. If you choose a color-in image you'll have a nice selection of funny and original characters created by Plasq to choose from, like Bugsy the Beagle or Chester the Cat. Working with iSight is also very easy and fun. Take your picture and start coloring.

Using the brushes and pencils and applying colors is a real pleasure and vector drawing really makes a difference. Also, having the full screen view really enhances the quality of the experience, even though it would have been nice to also have the choice of a windowed interface. You'll also note that Doozla has some fun little sound effects to accompany your movements and actions. You can easily switch them off if you don't want them.

In all, even though Doozla is the perfect application to teach your kids how to draw it's so intuitive that it's also really fun to use for adults. I, for one, really enjoyed playing around with it. Definitely recommended.

Download Doozla 1.1 in Softonic

Whether you're an amateur just looking to dip your feet a bit deeper into the world of photo editing, or more serious photographer looking for a quick and easy to use tool that can handle a large percentage of your editing needs, PhotoComplete could be for you.

PhotoComplete's intuitive photo editing interface allows you to concentrate on the job at hand, without getting in the way, yet still has the power and flexibility necessary to allow you to achieve professional quality results.

PhotoComplete's unique all-in-one-window interface lets you concentrate on achieving the look you want in a photo without having to wade through a sea of pop-up windows or a myriad of confusing options.

Choose from a selection of different actions that may be used to edit a photo. Each action remains editable at all times - if you change your mind about something at any point, just change it - no need to worry about losing any other edits you've applied before or after.

All the standard photo editing features you'd expect to find, such as crop and resize, color and contrast enhancement, and sharpening are present, along with some welcome extras like noise reduction which you'd normally only find in much more expensive applications.

PhotoComplete's easy to use features don't come at the expense of quality. All the editing operations are performed using 16-bit data (instead of the 8-bits that most editors use), and the high quality color management ensures that what you see on the screen really is what you get.

Once you've got a photo looking how you want it, save it in one of the standard formats (JPEG, TIFF or PNG) or upload it to flickr.com to share it with your family and friends.

Download PhotoComplete 1.2.2 in Softonic

Inkscape is an Open Source vector graphics editor, with capabilities similar to Illustrator, Freehand, CorelDraw, or Xara X using the 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.

Download Inkscape 0.46 in Softonic