14 DAY TRIAL // RibbonVu is more than just an image viewer. With its capabilities to create slideshows, this program outgrows most of the software solutions of its type. In addition, it's got abilities to timestamp your images or set them as wallpapers.
When deciding which image viewer is your favorite, you need to take into consideration the additional advantages it offers you. If you’re just looking for an image viewer, you will find plenty that will do only this job (even Windows Photo Viewer suits the task). Provided that you need a tool that will help you to manage and personalize your photos, you will most probably need to crack open the piggy bank, because these come at a price.
RibbonVu is a compromise between the two mentioned above. It is a simple utility that aside from its main function as an image viewer enables you to manage your pictures in a simple and comfortable way.
Its most attractive attribute is that it comes free of charge and that’s hardly something you can resist to. It installs in a jiffy and its Ribbon interface makes it all the more appealing and easy to work with.
The application window is divided into four main areas: the upper toolbar, the folder explorer, the viewing panel and the space reserved for the image thumbnails.
In order to view and manage images, you will need to select the folder containing the pictures of interest. RibbonVu features an easy-to-use folder explorer that will ease the job of locating your images. Once you have selected the folder, the software will list its contents in the thumbnail selection. By default, the thumbnail size is 125x125, but you can change it from the Options panel accessible from the Utilities tab.
Now all you need to do is to click on the photo you want to view and from now on, you can begin to explore the program’s benefits. Just above the image viewing panel, you’ll come across the zoom toolbar. The Zoom function can also be triggered by the mouse scroll, but you can also set it manually in the corresponding box.
RibbonVu’s most important functionalities are located in the Browse tab. The upper toolbar is wisely grouped in three columns: Image Utilities, File Utilities and Show. From here, you can view your images in full screen. A small disadvantage comes from the fact that this feature works for one image at a time. Once you’re in full screen view, you won’t be able to use the arrow keys or the mouse to move on to the next picture. The only possibility is to return to the main window of the program, select another image and press the “Full Screen” button again.
This is somewhat compensated by the application’s ability to create slideshows. The program provides two possibilities to trigger this function. The first one, and the simplest, is the quick slideshow option that you can access by manually selecting the images you wish to include in the slideshow from the thumbnail section (hold the CTRL button to select multiple photos) and pressing the “Slide Show” button or the CTRL+D key combination.
Make sure you select more than one picture for the quick slideshow, otherwise the software will display the “Advanced Slideshow” dialog. This feature allows you to customize the image interval and the background and text colors. Once you’re done configuring the slideshow settings, you can start it, lay back and enjoy it. The Slideshow screen of the program provides you with buttons to pause it, move to the next image or shuffle the image order.
Most image viewers provide the option to set images as wallpapers. This one does too. The all-time popular centered, tiled and stretched views are made available to you with this little app. Though throughout the application, you will find a great variety of shortcut keys assigned for many functions (read the help file for more info), the “Set as wallpaper” feature is deprived of this.
Aside from the graphic related functionalities mentioned above, the application also makes your time worthwhile by throwing a few file utilities in the game. It provides a useful shortcut for viewing the properties of an image and offers you a simple way to modify the image timestamps. The latter makes it possible to alter the creation date, modified or accessed of a picture.
The Search utility will prove to be of great use in case you want to search images by type, date or size. First of all, you need to specify the directory to be searched and then you can use the filter field to enter the file type to be found. As for the date and size, the program is capable to perform an advanced search by a wide range of criteria. Searching for images created on a specific date or greater in size than a specified size is no tough job for this application. This feature works pretty fast so there will be no wasted time on your side.
The last of the application’s features is the Loupe function that you can use to magnify the area around the mouse cursor. If you need a greater level of detail on images, you can increase the zoom level by right clicking on the title bar. The zoom actually goes to 1400%, so you will be able to view the pixels in their smallest detail.
Though it does its job as an image viewer impeccably, RibbonVu lacks what most of the software that fit this profile don’t. Image rotation and resize pictures are only two examples of the features that should be implemented in order to claim its place in the image processing category.
The Good
There is nothing complicated about RibbonVu. It’s very intuitive and anyone should be able to figure out the usage in a couple of tries. The developers also provide an extremely well organized help file that will be of great assistance in case you need it.
The Bad
Aside from lacking image rotation, RibbonVu is too costly on the system resources. The processor usage ascends especially when the application locates and displays the images. It peaks at about 45% with a RAM consumption of up to 500 MB (tested on Intel Dual CPU T2410 with 2 GB of RAM). Not just any user can afford this kind of resource spending on their computers. The Truth
RibbonVu has the style and the potential of a decent image processor and spending time with it may not leave a bad impression after all. The slideshow and timestamp capabilities turn it into more than an image viewer. And since it’s free of cost, you might as well give it a try.
However, if you consider that its functionalities are not sufficient for your necessities, you can always take a look at RibbonVu Professional.
Here are some snapshots of the application in action:
