However you do it, though, is really up to you. However, for best quality, I have found it best to actually scale down a copy of the image in the graphics program itself, make adjustments as necessary (some details don’t always look right when simply scaled) and then export the adjusted image.
![black mac folder icon png black mac folder icon png](https://cdn.dribbble.com/users/2404/screenshots/4754543/preview_2x.png)
The quickest way is to just take the same image and scale it down while exporting. How you go about exporting these image sizes is up to you. Now, we need to export ten PNG versions of this image, each with its own size and name. Once you have your icon looking the way you want it, go ahead and save the file. It’s actually an interesting read no matter what (at least if you’re interested in icons and such). If you’re creating an application icon, I highly recommend following Apple’s OS X Human Interface Guidelines when creating your icons. This image will now have the same size and transparency as the original, and can now be loaded into its own layer in any graphics editing program that supports them (which should be most of them).
![black mac folder icon png black mac folder icon png](http://cdn.onlinewebfonts.com/svg/download_59047.png)
OS X 10.7.5 Lion or later including macOS High Sierra.In an interesting twist, when Apple made icons a little more complex with the addition of Retina icons in OS X 10.7, they actually made the process of creating the icons a lot easier all you need is a little skill with your favorite graphics program that can create images with transparent backgrounds (such as TIFFs or PNGs), and you can crank out custom icons for custom folders, internal and external drives, or even applications using built-in utilities and features of Lion and later. Some worked well, and others not-so-well. Later on, I wound up registering a Developer account with Apple so I could use the icon tools in Xcode (well… and for AppleScript Studio, but that’s a different story), and probably tried a half-dozen different freeware or shareware utilities over the years. Back then, I was stuck with 256 (or fewer) colors, a black/white alpha channel, and pretty much had to make them pixel by pixel in ResEdit (uphill… both ways… barefoot… in the snow…). I’ve been making my own Mac icons for folders, applications, and a myriad of other uses for well over 20 years now.