BonAView 1.9.0

Overview

BonAView represents what a superior freeware has to be – rich in features, intuitive and modern in interface, safe to install and run, no hidden ads and pop-ups. A powerful photo and image manager BonAView implements 3D interface for better user experience. Sort and catalog, edit and improve all your images. The number of editing tools is extensive and includes, but not limited to, red-eye reduction, rotation, sharpening, blurring, adjusting color and more. BonAView photo manager is a powerful image viewing and management system ample for both beginners and experts.

Installation

Installation is a typical Windows based application process. It prompts the user to close other applications and asks where to create program shortcuts, etc. There is no bundled software or Adware in this pack. There is a short list of requirements for BonAView to run smoothly:

- Intel or AMD x86 CPU with >1 GHz 
- 256 Mb RAM
- Graphics card with 128 MB of Video RAM
- 50 MB on HDD
- Latest drivers for graphics card

Otherwise, you may experience slow performance when in 3D view.

Interface

The interface of this program is a delight to work with – modern, neat, intuitive. The 3D view is very cool and works like a charm. Editing, rotating, creating screen shots, sorting and compartmentalizing your digital photos is easy with this smart freeware. The program generates 3D thumbnails and displays them in the interactive 3D window where you can navigate, rotate, flip horizontally or vertically your images in one click.

Pros

- Automatic enhancement tools that adjust the color balance of photos are an advantage many beginners will appreciate.
- Image searching tool comes very handy when you need to find a picture and can not remember where you saved it.
- Filtering tool will help you significantly narrow down the search.
- 3D thumbnails and 3D view in general look beautiful and are easy to navigate and work with – rotate, flip, move between images.
- The feature of assigning categories allows for better organization and management of your photo collection. The number of categories you can create is unlimited; levels of the hierarchy of categories are unlimited; adding images to categories is easy with drag-and-drop feature; the number of images you can add to categories is unlimited.
- Classic image editor features are easy to perform: red-eye remover; remover of unwanted color cast; special effects; adjusting color balance, brightness and contrast; cropping and re-sampling; sharpening or blurring; adding commands to photos; database backup option.
- More useful features are available to measure distances and angles in the photos, to add watermarks, to add vector objects.
- EXIF/IPTC editor enables editing/deletion/adding of almost any IPTC or EXIF information embedded in your photos.
- Import images from any device. BonAView supports a large number of file formats.

Cons

It cannot be viewed as a con per se, but you need to keep your system drivers up to date for this graphical application to run smoothly.

Alternatives