Welcome • User Guide
ToS • Privacy • Canary
Donate • Bugs • License

©2025 Poal.co

729

I haven't drawn in years outside of mechanical or design sketches. I really haven't done much in the way of artist drawing since my really good set of colored pencils were disappeared long ago.

Paper has historically been my canvas, whether it's combined with pencil(even the colored variety) or quill and inks. I have never used a digital drawing pad before and really have no idea about quality, specs or even interfaces of outside of product adverts and reviews.

Canvas size with scanner size with scanner cost with physical media VS learning curve with compute with drawing pad.

Help! Those that have use drawing pads, what's your experience with?

I haven't drawn in years outside of mechanical or design sketches. I really haven't done much in the way of artist drawing since my really good set of colored pencils were disappeared long ago. Paper has historically been my canvas, whether it's combined with pencil(even the colored variety) or quill and inks. I have never used a digital drawing pad before and really have no idea about quality, specs or even interfaces of outside of product adverts and reviews. Canvas size with scanner size with scanner cost with physical media VS learning curve with compute with drawing pad. Help! Those that have use drawing pads, what's your experience with?

(post is archived)

[–] • 1 pt

I switched to an iPad with procreate and affinity a few years ago and have never looked back. The ability to try new brushes and techniques and then just remove a layer if I don’t like it is amazing. I honestly have never thought of switching back. Good luck

[–] • 1 pt

I can second this, I’d mention to add in an Apple Pencil. Procreate is a pretty awesome program.

[–] • 1 pt

Sorry! Yes Apple Pencil is a must. I’m so use to it being part of my iPad I forgot to mention it haha

[–] [deleted] • 0 pt

Do you have experience between the 1st and 2nd gen pencil versions?

[–] • 0 pt

No I sure don’t. If you Reddit you can ask questions in R/Procreate, or even just use the search function to get some opinions.

[–] [deleted] • 0 pt

Great info! I have an iPad mini sitting around and never even thought about putting it to work in other ways like this. I suppose it's at least a good way to dip my toe into the digital space.

[–] [deleted] • 0 pt

Procreate is a pretty extensive application for $10. I got it and a pencil and just started fooling around with. Thanks for the info.

[–] • 1 pt

Bump.

[–] [deleted] • 1 pt

Thanks for the bump.

[–] • 0 pt

I'm interested too. Looks like the iPad w/ Procreate is the way to go. Do you know if it come with a stylus or is it limited to mouse input?

[–] [deleted] • 0 pt

The stylus is separate. Check out apples site and search for Pencil. There's two versions of (1st and 2nd gen). You'd need to verify the comparability of whatever iPad version that you get. I have an iPad mini 5th gen so I need to go with the 1st gen Pencil.

Best buy, and even Apple, has them for sale refurbished so you can save a few bucks going that route.

[–] • 1 pt (edited )

I enjoy drawing and use a Wacom Intuos Pro[M]. (wacom.com) It's the current gold standard for drawing that people aim for. You can buy some used ones from ebay to play around wThat's the quality standard people go for. It is an adjustment to use a tablet because you hold the pen in your hand and look at the screen, but it's nice because you can experiment and play with colors without messy paint. You can also buy the screen tablets, but I haven't forked the cash out for those yet. Alternatively there's tablets, and one of the iPads is very popular but I don't use it.

As far as art applications I recommend Clip Studio Paint Ex. It does have japanese cartoons to advertise it but it is an excellent program to use and there's a huge portion of jewtube videos with it being used. It often goes on sale for a good price at 50$(?) and it's based in Japan, (same with the Wacom tablet.) Also there's a whole lot of drawing and art tutorials on jewtube, so it's well loved by a whole lot of people. There's also Procreate, but I don't use it but it has a more of a classical painterly feeling to it.

I wouldn't get photoshop to do art in, they overcharge and always try to sell their cloud/membership/bs. A lot of people are moving from it because of that.

Learning art, I'd recommend Marc Brunet (youtube.com) if you're interested in drawing human characters. He really breaks things down well for beginners + advanced and his art looks pretty good. He used to work for Blizzard and taught art.

[–] [deleted] • 0 pt

Thanks for the info on your experiences with. I may give a dedicated drawing pad a go once I get a decent workstation setup. For the time being I'm giving an iPad and pencil a go. So far I'm rather pleased but need to figure out a few more things to make it work how I want.

I gave up on Photoshop years ago. I'm not a professional so gimp has been good enough for anything that I need to do on a workstation.