Thread 7694901

My setup is dog shit and it needs to change if I'm going to improve. I feel like I've been drawing on an etch-a-sketch for like 15 years. My drawings on paper don't have these problems, but the reason I like digital painting is so I can transform things (flip, stretch, cut and paste), adjust colors with sliders, have an undo button, etc.

I'm using --first of all-- gimp 2.8 which is what I've been using since like 2008, and I have the cheapest intuous wacom tablet I could find at best buy around 2011. I don't know if it's the tablet or the software but I just have no control over what I'm drawing. In order to compensate for the complete lack of control over where the cursor goes, I zoom in like crazy but I'm tired of it. I'm an adult, I'm not poor anymore, I want the kind of screen I can draw on with minimal or negligible parallax, and software that allows me to draw a smooth line and to actually have pressure sensitivity.

>>7694901 (OP)
I don't use a screen tablet but just get CSP or pirate Photoshop

>>7694901 (OP)
screentablet + csp

I have screenless Wacom, standard paper size and I wear sketching paper on top of it for better feel, traction and to protect the surface. I use Krita.

>>7694901 (OP)
>>7694901 (OP)
GIMP kinda sucks, use Krita if you want to use free open source software. It's much better for drawing and painting. Lots of people use Clip Studio Paint these days or have just stuck with Photoshop.

As for tablets with screens, there are two types. Displays that you have to plug into a computer and then standalone tablets that have the PC built-in. Which one you should get depends on your preferences and budget. You should get a VESA mount for a display tablet, spending hours drawing at on is bad ergonomically. You need a good desk setup to mitigate this. Plenty of pros prefer using screenless tablets because of this. If you want more portability, like to sketch on the couch, you may want a standalone one.

As for brands, Wacom is the best for features, build quality and warranty but they cost a lot more. Xencelabs is the next best, but still pretty expensive but not quite as good as Wacom. Then there's the XP-Pen and Huion. 90% as good as the others but half the price. Just buy off Amazon for easier returns in case you need to. I've heard a few stories from pros that had to send theirs back due to issues. Any display tablet made in the last 5 years or good enough. They are mostly the same these days since Wacom's patents expired. Just decide on the size and if you want 4K resolution or not.

I've seen thailander artist draw on shitteir 4th hand tablets. OP literally has zero excuse lmao

>>7694901 (OP)
>Gimp 2.8
That brings me back! I used that around middle school to make sprite comics with dreams of owning a tablet. Got my first one for $70 and it was horrible.Funnily enough in 2014 I bought my own computer and intuous 4 with my $10.50/hr UPS job. I still use that intuous, drawing digitally while looking up is second nature to me, my computer PSU just blew up so I now try to use my x220 tablet thinkpad to draw and it's not intuitive, I've had Galaxy tablets, Ipads, a monoprice screen tablet- it all feels wrong to draw on. Traditionally I have no problem drawing and my strokes are more controlled and stronger but I feel that's the case with everyone.

>>7694901 (OP)
use opentabletdriver if you don't want to deal with Wacom's driver bullshit (I swear to god it just breaks itself on a whim), as for drawing software just try the ones you can be bothered to download or pirate then just pick whichever one feels the most intuitive for you

>>7694901 (OP)
I've tried lots of art programs before, all of them bring something different to the overall drawing experience for better or worse and I made a tier list ranking them, I'm not sure how much you keep up with things in general if you're still using GIMP 2.8 (3 came out this year, you should go check it out it's really good), so I'll just talk about the three in S tier and the first in A since those are the most commonly used art programs these days.
>1.EASY PAINT TOOL SAI
If you've been drawing since the late 2000's you probably already know this one. It's still #1 when it comes to any realistic blending and color mixing with only Clip Studio Paint (ranked 3rd on this list) coming anywhere near and even then it still doesn't get it quite right. It's fast and simple to use and only takes up about 10mbs of space. Go with this if your PC is older or you have low specs. Give SAI 2 a look too. It's still in beta but it's never crashed in the 6 years I've been using it and it has lots of QOL updates from the original. Really good price at only 30 - 40 USD. If you were only going to buy one art program I'd say buy this one and never regret it.

>>7694901 (OP)
A shitty Celeron laptop, a wacom intuos m and either CSP or Autodesk. Tbdesu CSP, Krita and Gimp feel too heavy for my laptop, so i'm upgrading to a desktop.

>>7694948
>2.Krita
Despite being developed since like 1999 Krita has really only become a popular option in the last 6-7 years. It's come a long way from when I started using it back in 2013. The best at realistic brush textures and most affordable way into getting started with animation. Krita is considered to be a difficult and confusing program to use but My advice for for that is to remove all panels and windows you don't actually use and change the shortcuts. Make software conform to you, do not conform to software. It's 100% free so even if you decide on something else there's really no reason not to have Krita on your hard drive.

>3.Clip Studio Paint
THE most popular drawing program for the last 10 years.
Has the most brushes, tutorials, and even 3D models built right inside. used by professional mangaka and animators, If you're ever stuck, you'll always find an answer to your problem. CSP's large community is probably the best thing it has going for it. The second best thing is how customizable the UI is, you can turn almost any button into a shortcut or modifier key, have buttons for filters or specific actions like the color of lineart with 1 button, or even recording repetitive tasks and being able to replay them over and over. In a competition of efficiency Clip is definitely king. It is however also the king of having the most confused subscription model and upgrade system.

When you need a whole ass flowchart for how to purchase a license, you know something here is fucked up. And when it comes to price CSP can range anywhere from 20 to 258 USD depending on what version you're buying, with EX being the flagship top of the line product. It does go on sale at least once a season so don't buy it until then, and skip every other version because you will not get all the updates unless you pay for the monthly plan. You have been warned.

>>7695023
4.Firealpaca
The last one I'll talk about. Popular on mobile devices but has a desktop version too. The original program is called Firealpaca but it comes in three other varities which are Medibang paint, Jump Paint, and Firealpaca SE (the only one that is a paid version). They all have subtle differences
that I"m going to shorten as such: If you make comics, pick Medibang or Jump paint, If you're interested in animation, pick either of the Firealpacas. aside from that clusterfuck of branding this is a really solid option for drawing. it has the best brush stabilizer, can run on windows, mac, or linux, and is very low on resources, second only Paint Tool SAI. It also has a lot of features that not many programs have, like manga screentones and gradient maps. Not a bad little program at all only real difference between the free and paid versions is if you want to pay 50 bucks for a dark theme, but the devs have promised GPU acceleration in the future which is pretty crazy for such a small team, but the free one is more than enough I think for most artists. Worth checking out at least once.

On the subject of Graphics tablets, holy shit there is like too much to talk about. We've come so far from prehistoric graphires or bamboos, 1024 levels of pressure? try 2k, 4k, 8k, hell even 16k nowadays. We have tilt, buttons, wheels, they come in different colors, it's insane. And we have more options than just Wacom with Huion and XP-Pen. You can actually have a screen tablet for less than 1000 dollars, My Huion Kamvas 13 was only 250 when I bought it a fews years ago and it's still just as good as the day I first got it. I was thinking about upgrading to one of the newer gen 3 models 'cuz they look so cool but I can never justify to myself because there's nothing wrong with the one I have. Good quality construction.

If you actually got through my high-octane rambling I'd be amazed but I hope this was useful to you in some way OP.

g moto stylus

>>7694901 (OP)
I just use Photoshop and a mouse.
what you need more?

>>7694948
photoshop is A-tier

Intuos4 medium and PS CS6 on a 14yo gaming rig that runs on WinXP. It just works.

>>7696149
Drawing with mouse is slow and fucks up your wrist. Use tablet, screenless is fine

>>7698977
Literally anything Photoshop does or tries to do is done 10x better in any other drawing program/image editor. Why would I use it over anything else on that list?

>>7694948
my opinion PS rank is B
Photoshop pressure recognition is terrible but for painting with lots of texture it is quite good, we have mixer brush, pattern clone, blend if, ..etc. so if you are aiming for linework, CSP or Paint Tool Sai is a better choice.

>>7694901 (OP)
I use csp on the phone

>>7694948
Thoughts on ibis paint? It's what i'm using rn

>>7699138
I tried using a tablet but didn't like it as much as a mouse. I joke about drawing with the mouse a lot. but I always start with a trad drawing.
<---here's my battlestation btw. the most important part is the table on the right

>>7694901 (OP)
I use a XP-Pen Tablet, and CSP. I Recommend using CSP because of all the free brushes and assets you can get your hands on.

>>7699304
idunno but i like using it. but i know other programs are better.

i got the 2023 version and it is a 1000x improvement over what it used to be.

>>7699408
Understandable. You would need to have a desk for drawing tablet and your battle station certainly wouldnt fit one. Do what works best for you.

>>7694901 (OP)
wacom tablet (no screen, 2019 model) with Photoshop CC

>>7694901 (OP)
intuos 3xl and cps/krita

>I don't know if it's the tablet or the software but I just have no control over what I'm drawing

if your tablet is screenless then try getting a tablet that matches the surface area to the size of your monitor or vise versa.

>>7699344
>Photoshop pressure recognition is terrible
this is one of the biggest reasons it ended up in D tier in the first place! Adobe has had 30 years and billions of dollars at their disposal, and yet no one thought that maybe, just maybe, a program that's marketed as being 'for artists' would need some way to adjust the global pressure curve? not even a slider? The lack of any specific tablet settings in PS drives up the wall. Don't get me started on the way texture is handled either. It feels vile
>>7699394
As a way to avoid being TOO biased, I'm going to seperate my thought about Ibis Paint into two sections:
>The actual program
Like, in a vacuum it's not so bad. I appreciate the amount of filters and layer modes, and the perspective tools are nice to have. I think the UI is cluttered, too many floating toolbars and windows are expanding and shrinking constantly.
I'm also not using on an Ipad or samsung, I don't have pressure sensitivity if that's something Ibis has so I can't really comment on that aspect. I'm also willing to forgive the slowness since once again, that could just be my tablet being low spec. If you've never drawn digitally before but didn't want to make a huge commitment than yeah Ibis Paint is fine. I might pick the mobile version of Medibang or Autodesk Sketchbook because I think their interfaces are less of a mess,
but for everything else Ibis paint would probably get into High C
or low B, somewhere below Inkscape on this list (which is something I need to revise, these days I'd put Inkscape in A tier).

>>7699876
>Drawing on Mobile
Now it's time for part 2, which Is not about Ibis Paint specifically but more so about drawing on phones and Drawings apps in general. It's D tier. If F existed on my list I would put all Mobile art apps there. Holy hell, people do this to themselves? You guys sit through ads just to use brushes? Painting with your fingers is a pleasant experience? You can't all be painting with 1500 dollar tablets, some of you must be drawing on screens that are 5-6 inches, how can you stand it? There are graphic tablets right now that you could get for 20 bucks, why not use those instead? this is a whole other rant but the fact that owning a desktop is regressing to almost the rates of the 90s is astonishing. Why are we going backwards? If you have the option please just use a computer to draw or even traditional art supplies, because this shit is NOT worth it.

>>7694901 (OP)
i use a pencil