Editing folder icons on macOS High Sierra

I am having this exact problem. It is very frustrating... the only workaround I have found is creating a square PNG with the picture I want as an icon inside; having two transparent "stripes" at each side of the original picture making it "square:. This way, finder thinks the icon is square because the sides are transparent but I keeps the ratio without distorting the image. It's a little long though...

As I was doing the same thing (cleaning up my movies library) up until now, I had to find a workaround, which was :

- Open the image in Photoshop,

- (unlock first layer)

- Image size / Set it to 1000 px height for exemple

- Canvas Size / set width to 1000px (yup... make it square 😉 with transparent sides)

- Save as PNG

(all of which can be recorded in Photoshop as a script, and can be applied to a folder full of images you'd like to use)

Open in Preview,

- Select All, Copy (cmd+A, cmd+C...)

- Paste in the usual Icon via cmd+I on the file / folder.

Weirdly, it actually crops out the transparent unused space, and shows it exactly as it used to before Sierra !

It's a pain in the ***, but you have to save it a transparent square .png file. So your icons can still be any shape as long as the the non image area is transparent inside a square shape.

It's an extremely annoying 'feature', and a regressive one at that. The only work-around I've found is to open the source image in something like GraphicConvertor, change the canvas size to a square, and then copy and paste into the folder icon window, which is time consuming and AFAIK can't be automated.

I'm now using Image2Icon, a free app, to create folder icons. All you do is drag the image you want to use as an icon onto it, and then drag the folder(s) you want to have that icon onto it. You can even rotate and resize the icon image before adding it to the folder.

wow! so i was having the same problem and i finally got it to work. I was getting a generic png file icon every time i tried to paste a new folder icon in. this is what worked for me.

i opened the "get info" pane on the folder. i clicked on the icon in the upper left (which now looked like a generic png icon). i hit delete on the keyboard which switched it back to the old blue folder icon. then i simply pasted it again. my custom icon showed up.

i had hit copy and paste about 100 times to no avail, but for some reason hitting delete and then pasting worked for me. i just spent a good hour fuming over this.

As the issue hasn't been resolved by apple yet, I have a solution for now until hopefully they change it back.

Copy the photo you want onto a word or page etc.

Then take a screenshot (command + shift + 4), make sure the screenshots is square and has an even white border around the photo.

After you have done that open the screenshot in preview, copy it then paste it on the folder you want it on and it should be the right size.

Using a transparent canvas which is a perfect square and then placing your object within those borders is exactly right. Haven’t seen any other solution. Thank you for the workaround—hopefully this foolishness will stop within an update or two to the OS. Or not…

Support for SlipCover is integrated into Add Folder Icons if you want batch solutions.

Add Folder Icons on the Mac App Store

I've tried its rectangular "DVD cover"-style mode and it preserves the correct aspect ratio. However, there's a really nasty new Finder bug which means on Retina displays it'll show a garbled mess (but switch to non-retina and it's fine, or press Space for QuickLook and the preview is fine). One step forward, two back.

If I can find a workaround I'll update the app, but given its manifestation, it seems likely to be something quite deep and core to the OS image generation and rendering system so it's going to require, most likely, blind luck to solve.

Same issue here. But Image2icon works !

I'm a little late to the party here. AFI was tested on betas and seemed to work, but it's definitely in trouble ever since 10.13.2 came out. The Finder displays garbled icons when changes are made. If you select a folder and press Space, the QuickLook preview shows the correct icon, so this is a Finder bug which started small and has since worsened.

I have been as yet unable to find a workaround, so this might be the end of the line for Add Folder Icons; Apple's software is now so buggy that it's becoming too frustrating to bother writing applications for it, especially when I have to pay an annual fee just to be on the app stores. On the off-chance that I do have a breakthrough with it, though, it's worth keeping the application installed a while longer so that the App Store will notify you of any updates.

Maybe Apple will fix the Finder's display problems, however I suspect that like all bugs of the last few years which aren't complete show stoppers or get them dragged over the coals in the press, it'll just be ignored. The only direction the OS X or iOS bug counts seem to go is upwards (rapidly).

Further to the above: Display in Add Folder Icons is OK in non-retina screen densities. Retina screens show a mess. If you switch between hi DPI and standard DPI modes, the Finder alternates between showing the correct thing, or a broken thing.

The trouble is, icons set on folders before High Sierra work fine in either density, so this looks like something got broken in the core OS image generation OR the rendering routines. Impossible to say. A bug's filed.

You will have to adapt your expectations to the new way.

Apple Feedback http://www.apple.com/feedback/

With your same Apple ID you can sign up for a free Developers Account and start a conversation with Apple engineers

Bug Reporter https://bugreport.apple.com/

I'm also having this horrible icon distortion when pasting in custom imagery. Haven't seen a viable solution anywhere. Attached is an image illustrating the old format (proportionate) versus the new (forced square distortion).

We gotta solve this.

same problem here. finder is freezing on loading external folders containing many custom folder or file icons as well as changing image ratio upon pasting a new icon. this is a major bug and it has not been fixed with the 10.13.1 update.