I am looking for digital artists out there on this one.
I am considering a pen tablet for CS5 and was curious to what was out there. I have seen a great deal of choices, but it can be overwhelming as this is not a normal item that I would use. I have been told by several people including my professor that a pen tablet really makes Photoshop, Illustrator, and even Fireworks easier to use. It offers a great deal of control and as it is pressure based I gain more control with my brushes.
On the market I have seen one company called Wacom and they seem to be getting all the good reviews. Their equipment is extremely expensive though, and I would consider one if the tablet lives up to the reviews.
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1: Tablets are worth it, they're absolutely brilliant for photoshopping, digital painting and bejeweled (what?)
2: Wacom is the only brand for tablets. Technically there are more but as far as I know nothing compares to Wacom's quality.
3: It's not that expensive. $69 for the bamboo isn't cheap but worth every cent twice over. Sure a Cintiq or Intuos is a lot better than a simple bamboo but unless you need the thing to earn your pay, have too much money or are really serious about digital art it's probably not worth it (Definitely not for the Cintiq)
4: Wacom tablets don't break. Seriously. I've had my bamboo for 5 years now and the pen tip is worn down in an angle from all the use, the pen has fallen on it's tip more often than I can count, there's scratches all over and it still works flawlessly.
2: Wacom is the only brand for tablets. Technically there are more but as far as I know nothing compares to Wacom's quality.
3: It's not that expensive. $69 for the bamboo isn't cheap but worth every cent twice over. Sure a Cintiq or Intuos is a lot better than a simple bamboo but unless you need the thing to earn your pay, have too much money or are really serious about digital art it's probably not worth it (Definitely not for the Cintiq)
4: Wacom tablets don't break. Seriously. I've had my bamboo for 5 years now and the pen tip is worn down in an angle from all the use, the pen has fallen on it's tip more often than I can count, there's scratches all over and it still works flawlessly.
I'm no artist, but i do dable, and i do have access to Cs5 at other job. Wacom tablet all the way, start with the bamboo one, it will be fine while you are learning, and after a few months of using it you will eaither put it down and never use it again, or you will buy a much bigger and better one. Until you know which, stick with the inexpensive one. I'd start with this one: http://www.staples.com/Wacom-CTT460-Bamboo-Touch-Tablet/product_812908 Look for it locally, you should be able to find it and avoid the $10 shipping. Print a copy of the ad to take with you, they should honor it in store if they have a higher price listed, or even be able to order it in at that price for store pickup to save you the $10.
Arch Duke Kaolian Drachensborn, lvl 95 Ranger, Unrest Server
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thanks for the responses. I did see the 70 dollar bamboo. I am going to give it a go and see how it works for me.
Edit, nevermind, didn't see it dind't have the pen.
Edited, Apr 18th 2011 11:03pm by Kaolian
Edited, Apr 18th 2011 11:03pm by Kaolian
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Yeah, the bamboo touch is an inexplicable piece of equipment, it's just a glorified laptop touchpad and I don't know why anyone would want that.
I have heard these pads (not Wacom in particular) can be extremely sensitive and it will begin reading a motion when the pen isn't close to the pad. Also, I have seen some people say that the tablets can interfere with the mouse operations, especially in games?
They don't interfere with mice as I have both my G5 and my bamboo connected to my PC.
And the tablet is sensitive, it reacts at hovering the pen over the tablet because actually touching the tablet with the pen is clicking (Which is what enables you to draw so easily)
And the tablet is sensitive, it reacts at hovering the pen over the tablet because actually touching the tablet with the pen is clicking (Which is what enables you to draw so easily)
His Excellency Aethien wrote:
1: Tablets are worth it, they're absolutely brilliant for photoshopping, digital painting and bejeweled (what?)
2: Wacom is the only brand for tablets. Technically there are more but as far as I know nothing compares to Wacom's quality.
3: It's not that expensive. $69 for the bamboo isn't cheap but worth every cent twice over. Sure a Cintiq or Intuos is a lot better than a simple bamboo but unless you need the thing to earn your pay, have too much money or are really serious about digital art it's probably not worth it (Definitely not for the Cintiq)
4: Wacom tablets don't break. Seriously. I've had my bamboo for 5 years now and the pen tip is worn down in an angle from all the use, the pen has fallen on it's tip more often than I can count, there's scratches all over and it still works flawlessly.
2: Wacom is the only brand for tablets. Technically there are more but as far as I know nothing compares to Wacom's quality.
3: It's not that expensive. $69 for the bamboo isn't cheap but worth every cent twice over. Sure a Cintiq or Intuos is a lot better than a simple bamboo but unless you need the thing to earn your pay, have too much money or are really serious about digital art it's probably not worth it (Definitely not for the Cintiq)
4: Wacom tablets don't break. Seriously. I've had my bamboo for 5 years now and the pen tip is worn down in an angle from all the use, the pen has fallen on it's tip more often than I can count, there's scratches all over and it still works flawlessly.
I was lurking on this thread.
Awesome link...I'm thinking about picking one up too. I've been meaning to get back into digital art (well, I suppose I shouldn't say "back" into it...my background is in architecture, and it's only tangent to it). I wanted to try my hand with a tablet, but wasn't sure what a good starting point would be for a novice.
That one looks great, thanks. SimpleMajority, if you do decide to pick it up, please let me know how it works for you.
Edited, Apr 19th 2011 2:34pm by Eske
@Eske I will let you know how it works out for me.
I bought my wife the WACOM Bamboo CTL460 and she loves it. Shes had it for about 5 months now and uses it daily and the nub is still good. I got it for 50 bucks new (still in packaging) on Ebay.
Now she's telling me she wants http://www.wacom.com/cintiq/ I told her I don't even want to KNOW how much that thing is.
Now she's telling me she wants http://www.wacom.com/cintiq/ I told her I don't even want to KNOW how much that thing is.
€1000 for the small one, €2000 for the large one.
His Excellency Aethien wrote:
€1000 for the small one, €2000 for the large one.
My point exactly, that costs more then my first car. I told her She can buy one if she starts selling her art work. Shes very talented at photo manipulation, good enough, in my opinion, to get a job or sell her art, and every day she just gets better. But alas won't listen to me.
SimpleMajority wrote:
@Eske I will let you know how it works out for me.
I got all twitchy and just decided to order one straight away. Guess we can compare notes!
So you're going to compare AWESOME! to AWESOME!
lol. Sadly I have to catch up on some bills and don't think I can swing it this check
From where I live to the school is a long drive and expensive (tolls + gas). I may end up waiting until I sell off my (once again) worthless books and buy the wacom then.
From where I live to the school is a long drive and expensive (tolls + gas). I may end up waiting until I sell off my (once again) worthless books and buy the wacom then.
An update:
Got mah tablet a couple days ago. Haven't had much time to play around with it yet, but I can tell it'll be fun just from the couple times I've sketched around with it. Pretty happy with it so far.
Some questions:
I'm using the Corel Painter Essentials software that came bundled with it. Is there another freeware program worth checking out? (I use GIMP already). Also, I've noticed lag proportional to the brush size (larger brush = larger lag). Is this to be expected? It's nothing troublesome, at any rate.
Got mah tablet a couple days ago. Haven't had much time to play around with it yet, but I can tell it'll be fun just from the couple times I've sketched around with it. Pretty happy with it so far.
Some questions:
I'm using the Corel Painter Essentials software that came bundled with it. Is there another freeware program worth checking out? (I use GIMP already). Also, I've noticed lag proportional to the brush size (larger brush = larger lag). Is this to be expected? It's nothing troublesome, at any rate.
Quote:
4: Wacom tablets don't break. Seriously. I've had my bamboo for 5 years now and the pen tip is worn down in an angle from all the use, the pen has fallen on it's tip more often than I can count, there's scratches all over and it still works flawlessly.
Yeah, I had my old jelly blue one last about 8 years before I gave up and retired it because the casing had cracked and needed to be taped and glued. The actual pen part of it and the tablet part of it worked just fine still.
Eske Esquire wrote:
Also, I've noticed lag proportional to the brush size (larger brush = larger lag). Is this to be expected? It's nothing troublesome, at any rate.
His Excellency Aethien wrote:
Eske Esquire wrote:
Also, I've noticed lag proportional to the brush size (larger brush = larger lag). Is this to be expected? It's nothing troublesome, at any rate.
Hmm. I've got a pretty powerful laptop. Well, it only occurs when I bump up the dpi and use a very over-sized brush. Thankfully, I don't think it'll impinge on anything. At least I know it's common enough.
Thanks!
Yeah, given that it's only occuring when you're using a very large brush, I'm 99.9% certain it's your laptop not keeping up with the amount of work required.
I don't know the specs of your laptop but it happens on my macbook (4gb ram, 2.4Ghz dual core) especially when using CS5.
I don't know the specs of your laptop but it happens on my macbook (4gb ram, 2.4Ghz dual core) especially when using CS5.
You can adjust the "refresh" rate of that by changing something called the "step" on brushes (at least I think that's what it's called in PS; I use 10 year old PSP7 still because I have a licensed copy I paid $100 for and dammit I'm gonna use it til it stops running on modern PCs.) The "step" is how many pixels it moves before it does a recalculation of the finished image. Adjust it upward if you're getting lag, to a max of no more than say 20-25. Very strong PCs or very tiny brushes can have the Step set to 1 without issues.
Edited, Apr 30th 2011 9:58pm by catwho
Edited, Apr 30th 2011 9:58pm by catwho
catwho wrote:
You can adjust the "refresh" rate of that by changing something called the "step" on brushes (at least I think that's what it's called in PS; I use 10 year old PSP7 still because I have a licensed copy I paid $100 for and dammit I'm gonna use it til it stops running on modern PCs.) The "step" is how many pixels it moves before it does a recalculation of the finished image. Adjust it upward if you're getting lag, to a max of no more than say 20-25. Very strong PCs or very tiny brushes can have the Step set to 1 without issues.
Edited, Apr 30th 2011 9:58pm by catwho
Edited, Apr 30th 2011 9:58pm by catwho
Ah, cool.
Yeah I did some research and found that Painter has controls that would alleviate the lag, but they're not accessible in the "Essentials" (read, stripped-down) version that came with the tablet. But since I'm just starting out, I'm just gonna use freeware for the time being.
I checked around and found Mypaint, and it's been working much better. Like, lightyears of difference. Looks like its brushes aren't as good at bristle simulation, but for the same reason, there isn't any lag. It had a few plugins for the brushes anyway, so now I've got a nice set to use that should more than suffice for me for now.
Between that and GIMP I think I've got everything I need to start learning.
CtrlPaint.
That link just cost you half a day, if you didn't know it yet.
Edited, May 1st 2011 11:38pm by Aethien
That link just cost you half a day, if you didn't know it yet.
Edited, May 1st 2011 11:38pm by Aethien
His Excellency Aethien wrote:
Awesomesauce! Thank you very much.
PS: link has the "r" & "t" switched.
Edited, May 1st 2011 5:21pm by Eske
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