Recommendations for affordable alternative to WACOM

[strider2000]

One thing I want to make sure willf is clear on, and it seems like you are, but just trying to help be sure, is the difference between a tablet and a tablet monitor (or drawing monitor). I've gone through all of the stages over the years, pencil drawings scanned in and then inked and colored, bamboo tablet, 21" Cintiq (drawing Monitor), Surface Pro and UGEE. With the bamboo, I personally had a very hard time getting any real value out of it for art creation. Art editing was great and animating a rigged character would be fine, but actually creating nice artwork, like even inking a scanned sketch was just to disconnected for me (drawing one place, looking another).

I really struggled over the purchase of both the Cintiq and the Surface Pro, but would now recommend them without any hesitation at all. If you're really strapped for cash I'd still highly recommend one of the Cintiq look alikes. UGEE, Yiynova, Huion and I've just seen one I haven't seen before Planar http://www.amazon.com/Planar-PXL2430MW- ... g+monitors for only $294 (don't know it's quality, but it had high reviews). All of them should work with any computer, because they're just vga monitors (double check, but I can't imagine one not working with whatever computer you have). The resolution is usually smaller UGEE, which I have is 1440x900, but it's only $400.

If you think about how much time you spend creating artwork, the drawing monitors are, without question, well worth their cost. There's no way I would ever consider digital art without one now.

I love my Surface Pro, but I agree with Chucky, wait 'til after July 29, because that's when the newest version is supposed to come out. Rumor is it will debut with Windows 10. If they have a 15", you can bet I'll be getting one for sure.

Using a Surface Pro for Anime Studio is a challenge. Some of us have been suggesting ideas for a more tablet friendly interface for Anime Studio (See viewtopic.php?f=5&t=19689&start=465#p155482) It kind of works if you're no where near a real monitor and you turn the tablet to portrait mode/orientation, but I only play with ideas there.

What it's great for is sketching and storyboards! I use Manga Studio, but you could use any decent art program, and I love sketching out my ideas. I can take it anywhere. In fact I have several electronic Bibles on it so I take it to Church and illustrate the sermons as I'm listening (I'm not really a great artist, but I find it fun and people like them.)

I've found that, for me, animating in Anime Studio doesn't really require any kind of tablet. The mouse seems fine, even for creating quite a bit of art, because of the vectors. But for any kind of art creation that's more organic and like pen/pencil or paint brush, I wouldn't even begin to want to do it without a drawing monitor. Even for morphing points with smart bones, like for head turns, I really prefer the stylus on the monitor. (Lassoing points is trivial with a drawing monitor For Anime Studio 11 I can't imagine wanting to do frame by frame without one, especially now that the brushes and drawing tools have been improved.

Maybe others are just a lot better at that disconnected drawing, but for me the drawing monitors are without any doubt at all worth the price. Hope that helps some.

[wizaerd]

About a year ago, I bought a Cintiq, the 13HD I think it was... Hooked it all up, and used both Manga Studio and Anime Studio on it, and instantly hated it. For a lot of the same reasons... everything being so gosh durn small on it. I disconnected it, and threw it in the closet, and there it sits. It wasn't portable, took up too much space on the desk, and quite frankly just didn't feel comfortable and natural at all. You gotta realize though, I'm not an artist, so it could've just been my own personal experience, but I didn't care for it.

I do like the Surface Pro 3 tablet better, because I can take it on the go, I can use it quite comfortably on my couch. Now if only Manga Studio and Anime Studio had truly tablet friendly UIs, I'd be in heaven...

[mattchee]

Maybe others are just a lot better at that disconnected drawing, but for me the drawing monitors are without any doubt at all worth the price. Hope that helps some.

I had a horrible time when I first started with non-monitor tablets. In fact, I threw mine in the closet for a year almost immediately after getting it, out of frustration. It's nowhere near as intuitive as one would expect. However, like anything else, I believe that with patience, practice, and persistence, anyone can get to a point where they feel comfortable and natural with it. I'd say it took me about two weeks of just really working with it to get to that point. It's just like any new skill, it needs to be practiced. I think people just get frustrated with it because they expect it to be intuitive right away (as I did), and it's not. It's soooooo not.

That said, if a monitor tablet is what you need, they're pretty dang sweet.

[GCharb]

I had a horrible time when I first started with non-monitor tablets. In fact, I threw mine in the closet for a year almost immediately after getting it, out of frustration. It's nowhere near as intuitive as one would expect. However, like anything else, I believe that with patience, practice, and persistence, anyone can get to a point where they feel comfortable and natural with it. I'd say it took me about two weeks of just really working with it to get to that point. It's just like any new skill, it needs to be practiced. I think people just get frustrated with it because they expect it to be intuitive right away (as I did), and it's not. It's soooooo not.

That said, if a monitor tablet is what you need, they're pretty dang sweet.

Only a matter of eye hand coordination, takes practice, like everything else, I used to do some exercice to get better at it, was actually sort of fun, in a demented way.

I worked on a Cintiq for some time, liked it, but they are expensive, I never tried one with Anime Studio though, but the enhancements in 11 might trigger me to get one, the 27HD looks really sweet, and it has killer resolution, but damn, 3 grans, my better half would probably have me packed in a rug and have me thrown off a bridge or something, of maybe a I will be tempted with a cheaper alternative!

[ruscular3d]

http://bosto-tablet.com/

It's made in Africa where the components of the material come from, and maybe why they can sell it cheaper. They are about half price! are they good?!?!?

[braj]

The Surface 3 (not pro) now run Win 8.1, will obviously run 10, instead of RT. I may go with one of those if they can manage AS ok, and Manga Studio 5. I'm not looking for perfection, but something that will serve as a good scratch pad. I am liking AS for animated storyboards now, you can work on an audio scratch track, add that to AS, then add a FBF layer as a storyboard as needed, even working out simple camera movements to see how they basically work together. It is making me excited really, it is great to be able to use AS without jumping to another computer. I'm not considering the Surface 3 for final work, but with reference layers now online, it will make the whole system feel much more integrated. Has anyone tried the cheap Surface 3s yet? I'm wondering how I could get AS demod on one.

[wizaerd]

I've got several messages in this forum about Surface Pro 3 tablet, and using Anime Studio Pro. For me, and it's strictly my opinion, it is unusable. Everything is way too tiny, buttons, cursor, points, etc...

[strider2000]

I definitely wouldn't get a tablet for AS. I agree that for animation it's very tough (I use it for that only in a pinch). I think the most likely use would be FBF for a draft layer (storyboard might be a good use if you want to be portable) since you can turn off the timeline and still access the FBF buttons. I personally would even turn off the document tabs to reclaim that extra space.

[braj]

I definitely wouldn't get a tablet for AS.

And that's a shame. I wonder what the timeline is before this is online, if it is even currently planned. I can't see how it couldn't be. At the least, if not scaling of the whole interface, it would be great to get an alternate interface that was specific to just applications that are suited to a tablet involving freehand drawing.

[strider2000]

Agreed.

[strider2000]

The discussion on alternatives to WACOM made me think through some of the ideas I had specifically with respect to Tablets, so I made a video on a few potential (and hopefully not to difficult) changes to AS that might make the Windows Surface Pro a nice approach for portable Pen Tablets. I think some of the ideas could also be helpful for desktop Pen displays. Here's the link for those that might be interested.
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=19689&p=157061#p157061

[mattchee]

I put AS on my Surface Pro 3 -- but mainly because I have it, and I can (I got the SP3 mainly as a portable solution for drawing/illustration).

Anyhow, it's definitely not the best on the SP3, mainly (as was mentioned) due to the size of everything. You could alter the resolution to counter that, but it's not a problem in other software (IE photoshop), so you would be adjusting res just for one program, which is a pain. So, I would definitely say do not go out and buy a Surface with the specific intent for it to be used for AS. You will be disappointed. If you already have a Surface, it's handy to have it on there, and not useless.

[strider2000]

Buttons are better in 11.1!!!
I just updated to ASP 11.1 and the button sizes are much better for the Windows Surface Pro!!! Yea. I imagine the same will be true for Cintiq Companion. The splash screen is a bit too big (no big deal). I personally find it easiest to undock the layers, timeline, style and tools palettes and position them overlapping to the right, with a little showing.

That way I can easily get to each palette yet save space.

Don't bring up the Shortcut dialog!
If you bring up the shortcut dialog you won't be happy, at least if you have a Surface Pro or Pro 2, because the dialog is too large. The end result is that you cannot get to the buttons to close the dialog (because it doesn't have a close "x" in the upper left). I had to use Task Manager to shut down ASP and restart.

[synthsin75]

Hitting enter will close the keyboard shortcut dialog.

[strider2000]

Hitting enter will close the keyboard shortcut dialog.

Aw ... Duh that should have been obvious to me
Thanks synthsin75

Also forgot to mention that the pinch zoom has been fixed. Two finger pan doesn't work yet, but things are better now