Radiant Canvas: native macOS app runs Krea 2, FLUX.2 and Qwen locally via MLX
toxicdog · reddit · 2026-09-15
A developer released Radiant Canvas, a native macOS app for local image generation on Apple Silicon, supporting Krea 2 Turbo, FLUX.2 Klein 4B, Z-Image Turbo, Qwen Image/Edit and ERNIE-Image Turbo — with no Python environment, diffusers, or ComfyUI backend.
Technical highlights:
- C++20/Objective-C++ backend on MLX + Metal, with a Swift app layer
- Each model family is integrated separately rather than squeezed through one generic runtime, handling per-architecture quirks
- The FLUX.2 path uses dedicated MLX CPU/GPU streams, keeps the engine between generations, explicitly frees heavy model parts, supports live previews and in-loop cancellation, and handles OOM/GPU failures
- Unified memory is factored in to pick safe internal render resolutions on 16/24GB Macs
- LoRAs load natively — up to 10 at once for FLUX.2 with separate strengths
- The 70+-node Studio graph actually schedules execution in dependency order: switches prune branches, and Cartesian Matrix/Zip/parameter sweeps create real execution branches
The author positions it between Draw Things (more mature, broader model support) and ComfyUI (more flexible but requires Python), pitching it as one normal Mac app that runs entirely locally.
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