The CImg Library is an open source C++ toolkit for image processing with the following characteristics :
Usefulness : CImg defines classes and methods for easy manipulation of generic images in your C++ code : Load/save various file formats, access to pixel values, display, resize/rotate/mirror, filter, draw primitives (text, faces, curves, 3D objects, ...), compute statistics, manage interactions, and so on...

Genericity : Provided image classes represent datasets up to 4-dimension wide (from 1D scalar signals to 3D hyperspectral volumes), with template pixel types. Structures for image collections and sequences are also provided.

Portability : CImg is highly portable and fully works on different operating systems (Unix/X11, Windows, MacOS X, *BSD) with various C++ compilers (Visual C++, GNU g++, Intel icc, Borland bcc, ...).

Simplicity : CImg is lightweight. It consists only of a single header file CImg.h that must be included in your C++ source. It depends on a minimal number of libraries. You can compile it only with standard C++ and system libraries. No need for exotic and complex dependencies.

Extensibility : Although not required, CImg can use functionalities of libraries such as ImageMagick, GraphicsMagick, XMedCon, libpng, libjpeg, libtiff, Magick++, Lapack, Board or FFTW3. Also, a simple plug-in mechanism allows any user to directly enhance the library capabilities according to his needs.

Freedom : CImg is a free, open-source library, distributed under the CeCILL-C License (close to the GNU LPGL License). It can be used in commercial applications.

CImg stands for "Cool Image" : It is easy to use and efficient. It's a very pleasant toolbox to code image processing stuffs in C++, and potentially covers a wide range of image processing applications. In the CImg package, a lot of examples are provided to help the developper in its first steps.