Create Leopard Screen Graphics With Opacity.

Just when you thought there could be no more graphic software for the Mac, Opacity comes along.

What’s so cool about Opacity? Can you say resolution independence? Look at the icons on Mac Leopard. That’s a hint of the future.

The Age of Leopard Graphics™ is here, and new graphics applications seem to be hitting the shelves (or, the download button) every week. Enter yet another graphic tool for Leopard users. Opacity.

There are more tools and floating palettes in the world of Mac graphics than I can keep track of. If you want to create a nifty Mac utility for those of us with too many, write one that helps us keep track of all the tools on all our graphic applications.

Opacity, at a very basic level, is a graphics editor, published only for Leopard users who create attractive icons and images for applications and the web.

The holy grail for designers (one of many, I suppose) using the Mac is resolution independence. Imagine a graphic or image that can scale up or down to nearly any size and remain sharp, vivid, crystal clear. Some vector images do that quite well.

Opacity comes along with that very purpose in mind—create beautiful, attractive, scalable graphics—that not only survive, but prosper at multiple resolutions.

Inside, you’ll find vector objects and tools, pixel editing, text manipulation, all with the intent to create Mac screen graphics that stand out from the standard JPG, GIF, and PNG files.

That said, Opacity isn’t really good for doing what many other Mac graphic applications and utilities already do.

Don’t use Opacity to edit photos, create print images, modify legacy images, or do what Photoshop, Illustrator, and GraphicConverter already do.

Opacity comes with templates to help you get started on new graphic elements, and you can build your own templates to suit your particular graphic needs. The vector tools used in a graphic element will look good at multiple resolutions, larger or smaller.

There’s filters, layers, and a variety of variables (my Friday attempt at a play on words) so you can manage complex elements; layers, colors, vectors, etc. The preview function lets you see your graphic as it will appear in your application or on a web site.

Start off in Opacity in one of four modes—General, Applications, Icons, or Web. Then build the layers you need, adding filters, elements, colors, and more. Oh, and it’s try before buy.

Opacity may end up with more web customers than Mac application customers but the overall result is the same—easy creation and manipulation of graphics that end up as resolution independent. Some may consider it a good thing, some not. But it’s on the way.

Now, if we can only get Apple to give us a version of Mac OS X Leopard which is resolution independent.