Lagging and random dropped stroke input!

[MattRage]

Certainly not trying to blame the user here and I didn't suggest there was any problem with you providing a specific example, in fact it's quite useful for us to have this info as I have said before. In this case, you also compared to the oil paint which you say is working fine, while other users above have said that the problem exists with the oil paint too, which is more useful information.

We have seen the specific problem you describe happen with the watercolour: It sometimes works slower specifically on the new iPad. When I say we can't replicate it 'reliably' I mean that we have have also observed times when the watercolor runs as fast as on the iPad 2. This leads us to believe that there's something going on in how the processing is happening and we're looking in to it as I said before. I haven't said that I doubt you can replicate it 'at will' which is also a handy thing to know because it helps us narrow down further what might be causing the problem.

All information is handy here, because there's something unusual going on and we need to track down the cause. Hope that clarifies my previous reply.

Edit: Speaking of which - Could you let me know if the closing of parked apps and rebooted as I suggested may help in the previous post makes any difference? This is important for us to know as we're looking in to it.

Regarding the panels: The new iPad has a 2x resolution screen, there's twice as much rendering work going on for the panels and as the device isn't significantly faster it will take longer for them to appear. We may look at either dropping panel resolution or using another solution in a future build.

[chinapete]

Thanks for the reply ... If I sound insistent, it's because AR is not a plaything or pass-time for me, I need to be able to work ...

Here's a little more texture to the problem:

1. Closing of parked apps has no noticeable effect on the lag, and neither does rebooting ... I work fast, and so am careful to run spare before I begin ... But on the iPad 2, I never had to worry about the iPad environment, it's only with the new iPad that I cannot achieve the fluidity of brushstroke I am used to ... The lag in changing Presets and bringing up other panels is not productive, the slightest slowdown in UI (when measured against my own expectation of how the program should work), causes me to lose concentration ...

2. The watercolor problem is particularly vexing, and if it is attributable entirely to lag, that's not a good thing, as the direction and shape of a stroke is extremely important to me as I develop a painting ... And not having any visual feedback until the brush is lifted from the paper is a show stopper ... I would have noticed this immediately in the old environment, and probably would have abandoned AR, but it was never a problem ...

3. When I say I can duplicate the problem "at will," I mean under various scenarios, recent reboot and tabula rasa, heavy work-in-progress, etc., I get the same result ...

4. For the watercolor brushstroke at the settings I gave you, I can minimize the lag by: hesitating a moment after I first lay down the brush on the paper (but of course this is entirely unnatural and produces the wrong stroke); slowing down after brush touchdown (also unnatural); making rapid successive brushstrokes of exactly the same type and length (this means no continuous line, among other things); painting dots ...

Of course I have the greatest confidence in your team, and very much appreciate the effort you've put into the tools you've built ... I just wanted to make sure I wasn't taken as a casual complainer ...

[MattRage]

Thanks for the detailed information, that should help a we work on finding out what's going on to cause the problem. I hope we'll be able to update with something soon!

[chinapete]

Thank you! In the meantime, I will do what I can on the user side to research the new iPad for mem management and related issues ...

By the way, it would be really great to have the watercolor tool on the iPhone, my platform of choice for sketching ideas ... I realize you (or someone on the team) has said that the iPhone was never intended to be fully developed, but with the advent of larger screened devices in the category, and probably one day the iPhone itself, I'm hoping to be able to use full-bodied AR on a device that I can hold in one hand comfortably as I paint ...

[chinapete]

I'm not sure whether Build 1.4 for the iPad was intended to address any of the issues related to lag or gap ... I downloaded it today, reset the iPad, closed all open apps, etc., but as far as I can tell, the lag persists with the watercolor tool at the settings I listed earlier ... So either there is something wrong with my new iPad -- this is possible, since I haven't seen other users post here with similar issues -- or Build 1.4 was meant to fix other, maybe unrelated problems ... I had to give up my iPad 2, so I can't go back and compare ...

[MattRage]

1.4.3 addressed a couple of problems that appeared in 1.4.2. The notes in the What's New section cover the details. We haven't submitted changes for the watercolor yet.

[Silent89]

As chinapete said,

With being a first time AR user I am tempted to abandon this app altogether, but seeing how you guys seem to be trying to fix the issues I am sitting by and waiting. I have yet to create anything on AR as when I try water colors or paint it lags...I have one layer only and feel like art rage is no good and unreliable and not fluid. Not entirely sure why it lags so much. with paint and water color on the screen all the same color even going through the menues such as the settings or any of the buttons on the bottom it lags...this app is definitely not fully usable with these issues.

[MattRage]

The lag with watercolour is something we're working on currently. It appears to be a redraw issue - The underlying tool is working at about the same speed on the new iPad as it did on the iPad 2, but the screen updates aren't happening.

However, that's a watercolour specific issue as we've been discussing here, and if you're seeing lag with other tools make sure you have followed the instructions in the lag/crash thread to make sure that your device isn't being slowed down by other apps in the background.

If that doesn't help, and if the problem does not appear to relate to the 'stroke gap' described in the help file under Memory/Speed then there may be another problem, feel free to drop an email to us (support@artrage.com) and we'd be happy to look in to your specific circumstances.

Panel appearance speed is due to the double resolution interface on the Retina iPad, that's something we're going to be looking at in another update.

[Pmarsteau]

For the record, I do have exact same behaviour on iPad 3, with watercolour tool. Actually I started using artRage for the first time using the watercolour as initial tool, and switched away to Procreate app due to the lag. Only after giving a second chance to the app, I realised all other tools weren't having any noticeable delay... Glad to read issue is being actively worked on.By the way, is there any plan in supporting the Jot Touch pressure sensitive stylus shortcut buttons?

[MattRage]

We will be looking at the buttons on the jot touch when we do another round of stylus work for a future revision, I can't say at this point when that will be.