If you are new to the idea of creating digital artwork, touching up your DSLR snaps or producing a newsletter, you may be wondering what all the fuss about using a graphics tablet is - and who is this Wacom fellow?
Put simply, a graphics tablet allows you to interface with your computer, but by using a pen rather than a mouse. With a keyboard and mouse, you would move the pointer around the screen, clicking on the icons and menus, creating your artwork by clicking and dragging the mouse in the desired motions. With a tablet, you move the pen around an "active area" that represents your same dimensions as your screen.
As you move then pen, which is held off of the active area, the mouse pointer moves in unison. When you are ready to draw, click or select, you push the pen onto the active area and the mouse pointer on screen follows the action. For artistic applications, this allows for much finer control and creativity. The mouse can be quite restrictive when trying to paint and draw, but using the pen and tablet is much more intuitive and easy if you are used to using a pen or pencil to draw.
The tablet also has a level of pressure sensitivity that allows for more natural strokes with the pen. For example, when you are drawing in an application such as Adobe Photoshop, you can apply different levels of pressure to the pen, which will make the pen line thicker or darker. Small features like this make owning a tablet worth the money.
Wacom is the name of the company that make graphics tablets and are considered to be the best. Their range of tablets range from the small Bamboo models, designed to be used at home, right up to digital LCD screens that double as a graphics tablet. These higher end models are only used by professional digital artists and designers.
If you want to read about the different kinds of graphics tablets available and which are the best sellers, click the following link to go to the authors website:
There you will find guides, information, tips and reviews of the latest and greatest tablets on the market today.
