Drawing/Graphic tablets

[Caramel Apple Pop]

My boyfriend recently told me that he'd want one of these for his birthday.. so I figured that some of you guys here would know something about them! I know absolutely nothing, and I want to make sure that I get him a nice one.

He wouldn't be using it for work or anything like that.. just mainly for drawing random stuff (he's a bit of an artist). So.. what I'd like to know.. mainly things like: what brands are best, how much will I have to spend for it to be a quality one, what size should I get, etc.

Any info you guys can give me on them would be great!

[Barefoot Matt]

As far as I'm concerned, the only brand to buy is Wacom. As for picking a model, try this: http://www.wacom.com/tabletwizard/index.cfm

I have the Intuos 2 6x8. I love it dearly. I think 6x8 is just the right size; any smaller and it's hard to do detail, any larger and you have to move your arm too much. The Intuos has better resolution and more features than the Graphire, but it's more expensive.

Whatever you get, you're going to be shelling out a good chunk of cash. I hope he likes it!

You might also ask around for advice on deviantART. Lots of people there use tablets.

[IGemini]

Yeah, Wacom is pretty much the way to go. If you want go for the better Intuos line, you're looking at $200. The Graphire tablets are roughly $100 for the smaller 3.5 x 5 tablets...I'm not sure what the fundamental difference is between the two, since I've only used the Intuos line, but you get your money's worth.

[PhoenixDown]

wacom deffinitely... the 6x8 was a nice size. I want to get one.

[Kuky]

Doesn't it feel different drawing on a plastic surface? Or do they do something so it feels more like the resistance you get on real paper? While I'm not much of an artist, I know that my writing quality plummets even further when attempting to write on a tablet PC or anything like that, so I would assume this carries over to the art world. Also, the fact that the line shows up behind a mm of plexiglass or whatever might affect precision. Am I missing something here? :).

[Barefoot Matt]

Kuky - yes, it feels different, and takes some getting used to. I use mine for photo retouching, which isn't something you do on paper anyway, so it wasn't hard for me. I've heard that a lot of "traditional artists" (painters and sketchers and such) will tape a piece of paper to the tablet to make it feel more natural.

For your other point, there's no problem with the line showing up behind a mm of plexiglass, because the line doesn't show up on it at all. These aren't touchscreens (although wacom does also make a freaking expensive tablet-PC-like monitor so you can actually draw on the screen), they're just tablets that map to the screen area. Your motions all appear exactly as you draw them, but on the screen instead of on the drawing surface. That, too, takes some getting used to, but if you think of it as a mouse it's not too bad, and you'll quickly discover that it's much more accurate, smooth, and comfortable than any mouse.

It's important to think of this not as an improvement to traditional drawing, but as an improvement to a mouse for digital drawing. Digital art has other advantages over traditional art, but the input method is definitely not one of them. A tablet can help to close the gap a bit in that regard.

[Kuky]

Aaaah, it's a separate input device, and not a stand-alone touchscreen. Ok, that makes a lot more sense now. So long as it has a means of detecting where the pen is while it's not touching the surface (for the same reason that making the mouse cursor disappear while the buttons aren't down would be horrible), I guess it can work out :).

[Barefoot Matt]

Yes, it can detect the pen position when the pen's not touching the screen. It's actually quite remarkable technology...

The surface itself is not touch sensitive. This is nice because it means putting your hand down won't cause accidental clicks. Instead, the pen has a pressure-sensitive tip (with 1,024 levels of pressure sensitivity for controlling such things as brush size). The pen's position is tracked by radio telemetry using signals constantly pulsed out from all along the edges of the tablet surface. These radio waves also power the pen, so there's no need for a battery. So, as long as the pen tip is within about an inch and a half of the tablet surface, the radio telemetry will track its position. This means you can move the cursor by hovering the pen over the tablet, and click by touching the pen to the tablet.