Wife needs an art tablet

[Slots]

Hey Everyone,

My wife's b-day is next week and she wants an art tablet. She draws and paints with watercolors now.

I think she'd like a tablet that has a visible screen, so she won't have to look at the monitor to see what she is drawing. I have an I-7 iMac and a low budget Windows 7 laptop. She likes to use MS Publisher on the laptop, so any output from the art tablet needs to export in a format that Publisher can read.

Any ideas on the right tablet?

Much obliged......

Slots

[Victor Osaka]

The only game in town IMO is the Wacom. I use the Wacom Cintiq 13HD wired to my MAC.

Then there are the stand alone Cintiq model which are more expensive.

[Slots]

Hi Victor,

What about a new iPad? How does the IPad work for an amateur?

Thanks,

Steve

[Slap Happy Larry]

If money is no object then I agree, get her a Cintiq. For drawing, a Cintiq is the best.

For painting (and it sounds like that's more your wife's style) the cheaper Wacoms are adequate -- I painted an entire picturebook using a Bamboo before upgrading to a large Intuos, mainly for arm-pain reasons. It takes a good number of hours to get used to looking at a screen while drawing down below, but you really do get quite good at it. But it's never *quite* as precise as drawing directly onto paper/screen. Making use of hotkeys to draw straight lines etc does help you to draw using a cheaper Wacom, as does changing your painting style to suit the digital medium.

[williamK]

Consider the Microsoft Surface Pro 3. Perhaps expensive but then again you get the full ArtRage application as well as any other drawing software out there for Windows. Some are free (krita is pretty impressive, albeit poorly documented), some are relatively inexpensive (ArtRage itself, packages like Twisted Brush), and of course there is Adobe. The SP3 was a bit flaky at introduction but has stabilized. The Surface pen works reasonably (only a pro could tell the difference between 256 and 2048 levels of pressure - if then). It is an elegant piece of hardware. (I own one the I5/8GB/256GB model.) You get a lot of down-stream potential as Windows is going to be a platform for the indefinite future. I also have a Wacom Intous Pro on the desktop - it works well but not that much difference on an ongoing basis.

[hildee]

I have a 4x5 and a 6x8 Intuos from Wacom. The larger is definitely better but I managed for years on the smaller one. It was such a amazing experience to start with, I never thought I needed bigger at the time

[Indoctrine]

I discovered why Wacom is at the top of the game a few days ago and it's because they've got a patented technology which uses radio waves to make the pen work without batteries, and it's the most precise. As for the Surface Pro (1,2,3), they have a Wacom digitizer, so are essentially the same thing. The Pro 2 should be going for a lot cheaper since the release of the 3. Personally, I had a Bamboo Fun Pen and Touch for several years before actually getting into digital painting... I used it continuously for about 6 months before upgrading to an Intuos Pro Medium last week.

[BillD]

Consider the Microsoft Surface Pro 3. Perhaps expensive but then again you get the full ArtRage application as well as any other drawing software out there for Windows. Some are free (krita is pretty impressive, albeit poorly documented), some are relatively inexpensive (ArtRage itself, packages like Twisted Brush), and of course there is Adobe. The SP3 was a bit flaky at introduction but has stabilized. The Surface pen works reasonably (only a pro could tell the difference between 256 and 2048 levels of pressure - if then). It is an elegant piece of hardware. (I own one the I5/8GB/256GB model.) You get a lot of down-stream potential as Windows is going to be a platform for the indefinite future. I also have a Wacom Intous Pro on the desktop - it works well but not that much difference on an ongoing basis.

I just picked up the Surface Pro 3 i7 256 and love it. I was using a Dell Venue 11 Pro 7130 MS. The larger screen of the Surface plus the extra RAM/Processing power makes AR run like a top.

[Victor Osaka]

And what did you get her? Is she a happy camper?

[Arjen Vriezekolk]

I'm working with the Hanvon artmaster3
Everything you need in a tablet without the pricetag that comes along with it usualy!

http://www.hanvon.com/en/products/ta...artmaster.html

Hope this will be of any use.

Arjen