Paper scribbles & Digital doodles.

I've owned 3 Graphics tablets in the past, my 1st was what looked like a bog standard 11" x 7" Wacom tablet; it was blue and generally blank but it was good.

My 2nd was a much nicer black Wacom bamboo, the same size of the previous but has an added bit on the side for scrolling which was a nice novelty.

Unfortunately, they both broke during house moves. My fault as I didn't keep the boxes for them. And not a tablet was had since then.

Until earlier this year after a generous American customer got a bit tip-happy at the Casino and inflated our paycheques something rotten, I splashed out £400 for my significantly bigger Wacom Intuos4 Wireless (Bluetooth) tablet.

The wireless is a definite help, being short of USB ports and desk space, also having a Bluetooth adaptor already in place, it was meant to be.

Strangely though, I've always worried about running out of paper while sketching, I like to use my sketch pads for my leisure sketching as opposed to using it for something requested/commisioned. It was only shortly after buying the tablet that I was told that using something like Firewors or Photoshop as a digital sketch pad is úber handy.

So I gave it a go and, by God, is it a lifesaver.

The benefits of sketching digitally rather than on paper is that I can practice as much as I like on as big a canvas as I want; and if I make a mistake I can delete it with the other end of the Stylus without wearing a massive hole in the paper or degrading the paper's quality.

It's not that I'm saying Digital is better than paper, Both have advantages and disadvantages.


For instance: I wouldn't teach someone to draw on digital, I would use paper, learning the original way is always best, also a graphics tablet can really only be used on a PC, for outdoor drawing; a laptop could be used but in my experience, tablets don't transport well.

With paper, I'm restricted to the size of the page, the kind of Pencil I use or how much of said pencil I have left. With digital those worries don't exist, but paper drawing is by far better feeling. You wouldn't be too excited to see your favourite artist at Comic-Con using a graphics tablet to do a sketch, it just doesn't feel the same.

Also a nice sheet of good quality paper with your own personal sketch on is yours, a digital copy can be duplicated, but that sheet of paper is the only one and it's yours!

So in closing, paper sketching is good, but digital sketching is always worth a look.