NSImage to NSBitmapImageRep

@Julius: Your code is way too complicated and contains several bugs. I will make a correction for only the first lines:

- (NSBitmapImageRep *)bitmapImageRepresentation
{
   for( NSImageRep *rep in [self representations] )
      if( [rep isKindOfClass:[NSBitmapImageRep class]] ) return rep;
   return nil;
}

This will extract the first NSBitmapImageRep if it is member in the representations or will return nil, if there is no NSBitmapImageRep. I'll give you another solution which will always work whatever NSImageReps are in the representations: NSBitmapImageRep, NSPDFImageRep or NSCGImageSnapshotRep or ...

- (NSBitmapImageRep *)bitmapImageRepresentation
{
   CGImageRef CGImage = [self CGImageForProposedRect:nil context:nil hints:nil];
   return [[[NSBitmapImageRep alloc] initWithCGImage:CGImage] autorelease];
}

Or to avoid subclassing of NSImage you may write:

NSImage *img = [[[NSImage alloc] initWithContentsOfFile:filename] autorelease];
CGImageRef CGImage = [img CGImageForProposedRect:nil context:nil hints:nil];
NSBitmapImageRep *rep = [[[NSBitmapImageRep alloc] initWithCGImage:CGImage] autorelease];

This will only return a single NSBitmapImageRep which maybe not good enough if the image contains more than one representation (e.g. a lot of NSBitmapImageReps from TIFF files). But adding some code is straightforward.

You could try this method adapted from Mike Ash's "Obtaining and Interpreting Image Data" blog post:

- (NSBitmapImageRep *)bitmapImageRepresentation {
  int width = [self size].width;
  int height = [self size].height;

  if(width < 1 || height < 1)
      return nil;

  NSBitmapImageRep *rep = [[NSBitmapImageRep alloc]
                           initWithBitmapDataPlanes: NULL
                           pixelsWide: width
                           pixelsHigh: height
                           bitsPerSample: 8
                           samplesPerPixel: 4
                           hasAlpha: YES
                           isPlanar: NO
                           colorSpaceName: NSDeviceRGBColorSpace
                           bytesPerRow: width * 4
                           bitsPerPixel: 32];

  NSGraphicsContext *ctx = [NSGraphicsContext graphicsContextWithBitmapImageRep: rep];
  [NSGraphicsContext saveGraphicsState];
  [NSGraphicsContext setCurrentContext: ctx];  
  [self drawAtPoint: NSZeroPoint fromRect: NSZeroRect operation: NSCompositeCopy fraction: 1.0];
  [ctx flushGraphics];
  [NSGraphicsContext restoreGraphicsState];

  return [rep autorelease];
}

Maybe late to the party, but this is the Swift 3 version from the @mrwalker response:

extension NSImage {
    func bitmapImageRepresentation(colorSpaceName: String) -> NSBitmapImageRep? {
        let width = self.size.width
        let height = self.size.height

        if width < 1 || height < 1 {
            return nil
        }

        if let rep = NSBitmapImageRep(bitmapDataPlanes: nil, pixelsWide: Int(width), pixelsHigh: Int(height), bitsPerSample: 8, samplesPerPixel: 4, hasAlpha: true, isPlanar: false, colorSpaceName: colorSpaceName, bytesPerRow: Int(width) * 4, bitsPerPixel: 32)
        {
            let ctx = NSGraphicsContext.init(bitmapImageRep: rep)
            NSGraphicsContext.saveGraphicsState()
            NSGraphicsContext.setCurrent(ctx)
            self.draw(at: NSZeroPoint, from: NSZeroRect, operation: NSCompositingOperation.copy, fraction: 1.0)
            ctx?.flushGraphics()
            NSGraphicsContext.restoreGraphicsState()
            return rep
        }
        return nil
    }
}