Open Source and Free Graphics Software for Mac OS X

There are a couple of graphics packages I'll be highlighting in this article. Even though they are great for use on Mac OS X, they also run on Windows and Unix based systems.

GIMP

The first graphics package is GIMP. GIMP is the GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is freely distributed and enables you to carry out photo retouching, image composition and image authoring. It also works in many languages other than English.

The GIMP comes with plenty of help documentation and there are turorials on the website. Some GIMP books are available as shown below. Very handy if you want to have a reference book to hand which tells you everything you need to know about GIMP.

Beginning GIMP: From Novice to Professional

The GIMP Pocket Reference

Inkscape

The second piece of open source graphics software that is great for Mac OS X use is Inkscape. Inkscape differs from the GIMP in that it is a vector graphics editor, with capabilities similar to Illustrator, Freehand, or CorelDraw. It uses the W3C standard Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format.

From the Inkscape website:

Inkscape's main goal is to create a powerful and convenient drawing tool fully compliant with XML, SVG, and CSS standards. We also aim to maintain a thriving user and developer community by using open, community-oriented development process, and by making sure Inkcape is easy to learn, to use, and to extend.

You can do some incredible stuff with these pieces of graphics software. And the best thing is that they're free! Three cheers for open source!!