Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Pencil Offers High Precision and Low Latency, Gains 30 Minutes of Use From 15-Second Charge
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
What's contradicting? Please explain.
Touching glass as a means of operating a smartphone was new and quite in the minority when the iPhone came out.
Apple introducing the Pencil and iPad Pro at this stage is addressing a somewhat specific niche of artists that want to draw on an iPad as closely as possible to real life. It also plays catchup (and exceeds in some ways) with the excellent Sammy Note series stylus use-cases (although this is a different segment) and maybe Wacom.
This is not to say that Apple is suddenly stating: we we're wrong..forget your finger...use THIS from now on.
As a matter of fact, Ive makes this clear right at the beginning of the Pencil video (or was it the iPad Pro?).
Apple has always kept artists on their product radar, and this combination is an additional tool that perhaps consolidates the Wacom/iMac setup into a mobile format. It's a smart move, I think.
Yes, they're "forcing" you to use their stylus (because the tech is dependent on having both devices). But it is a compelling setup, to be sure.
Don't let the haterade get in the way of logic, sir/ma'am.
Yes, for 15 seconds. That's clearly outrageous...
Yeah. The connecter sticking out of the pencil should be a gender changer. You just pull that out leaving a Lightning Hole (tm) that you can use with the regular iPad/iPhone charging cable. Huh.
If 15s gives you 30m does that mean it fully charges in minutes?
They also should have had like an iPod dock in the top of the Apple TV for charging the remote.
As for the "never ever ever ever ever ever ever ever have a pencil with a portable device," I ask this question:
Since we first picked up that stick from the fire that had a charred end, and drew on the cave wall, we have been using drawing sticks of one sort or another. The pen is a refinement of the finger, so why are we disregarding it?
I agree with Steve on phones (had so many Windows Phones with styli, and prefer the iPhone, except for signatures), on the iPad (whether that quote from him is in/out of context), I've wanted a stylus of one sort or another for it. It just seems natural for it.
Since we first picked up that stick from the fire that had a charred end, and drew on the cave wall, we have been using drawing sticks of one sort or another. The pen is a refinement of the finger, so why are we disregarding it?
I agree with Steve on phones (had so many Windows Phones with styli, and prefer the iPhone, except for signatures), on the iPad (whether that quote from him is in/out of context), I've wanted a stylus of one sort or another for it. It just seems natural for it.
The iPhone could use a stylus, but it didn't NEED one. Other phones at the time needed a stylus because the screens were too small. Steve would have been good with the Apple Pencil. That's how he learned fu*king calligraphy.
30 minutes of use with 15 second charge? God Bless Apple engineers
I have to admit, I'm really jealous this isn't compatible with my iPad Air 2, this is EXACTLY what I want with an iPad. I have ZERO interest in the iPad Pro because of it's gigantic size but an iPad Air 3 with Apple Pen support is a must buy for me
I have to admit, I'm really jealous this isn't compatible with my iPad Air 2, this is EXACTLY what I want with an iPad. I have ZERO interest in the iPad Pro because of it's gigantic size but an iPad Air 3 with Apple Pen support is a must buy for me
What I still find brilliant is that this is the first time I won't need to buy a new iPad after a year because my Air2 will be the current version for another year. Interesting that not "having" to buy anything this year ( I have an Air2 and an iPhone 6+) was the biggest news for me 
A pen is permanent and formal which, to me, doesn't fit in with Apple's culture. A pencil is creative, casual, and really the starting point of all things creative.
You're clearly not supposed to leave the pencil plugged in for longer than a minute or so (two hours of battery). To be honest, I thought the stick in to charge thing was kind of stupid the more I thought about it. This rapid charging changes that. Apple wanted the whole experience to be self contained. As long as your iPad has power, your keyboard and pencil have power too.
You won't break it. Just walk away for a minute while it charges and you're good to go!
Like a lot of Apple's stuff, it's poorly designed... why wouldn't you have a slot to put it in so it charges? I don't get why you wouldn't slide it into the device. At the very least have some way to slide it to lock it onto the side and charge, anything but frigging having to carry it around separate. Just weird how you have to plug it in and have it sticking out just waiting for it to be snapped off....
Not impressed.
Not impressed.
This exactly. I seriously can't believe people are trotting out that 8-year-old quote as anything other than a tongue-in-cheek joke about Apple-hate knee-jerk idiocy.
Apparently people have completely forgotten what the world was like prior to the iPhone. Remember the Nintendo DS? Various Palm PDAs? You apparently don't if you think Steve was talking about a drawing tool. Back in the day, you needed a stylus to operate many "touch" screens, and others basically needed one to be functional even if you could technically use a finger on the resistive screen.
A cell phone that requires a stylus for use has nothing to do with a purpose-built stylus for art on a bigscreen tablet (or even a 3rd party soft-tip capacitive "pen" so you can use your iPhone with fat fingers or a glove, for that matter). End of story.
Yes. The Surface Pro 3 actually comes with a fairly decent pressure-sensitive stylus and has, if I remember correctly, a Wacom digitizer built into the screen, which presumably serves a similar purpose to the extra-precision capabilities of the Pencil. It's pressure sensitive and accurate, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't do angle detection.
The latency is also terrible on it, though--I was going to recommend one to the artist who works for me, but after using it at work for a while I wasn't so convinced he'd be happy with it. The incredibly low latency on Apple's stylus looks like a huge selling point in comparison, although the fact that there isn't and likely never will be a version of Manga Studio for the iPad makes it a non-starter for my narrow use case.
This is true--I had a Wacom tablet with a passive stylus back in the '90s. But these days most high-end stylii do. Even the Surface Pro 3 stylus requires a battery now. I suspect angle detection, in particular, would be extremely difficult with a passive stylus, and I expect it also makes the hardware for the touchscreen much simpler, since it doesn't need to handle precise pressure detection.
[Edit: I just checked, and the Surface 3 stylus actually has three batteries. One AAAA battery in the main barrel, and a pair of coin cells hidden in the "eraser" area, I'm guessing to handle its clicking button.]
Last edited:
The speed of the Apple Pencil is very impressive. Others I have tried over the years (and recently) are frustrating to draw with because it seems like you're always one step ahed of what you're seeing. Hard to draw for me that way.
I can't wait to try the Apple Pencil myself. It may make digital drawing actually enjoyable and feasible. Given my artist background, it will be tempting to get one just for the drawing capabilities.
I can't wait to try the Apple Pencil myself. It may make digital drawing actually enjoyable and feasible. Given my artist background, it will be tempting to get one just for the drawing capabilities.
Apple co-founder Steve Jobs famously dismissed the need for a stylus when introducing Multi-Touch on the original iPhone over eight years ago, touting the finger as the best pointing device in the world.Macworld 2007 was quite awhile ago, however, and Apple on Wednesday ultimately reversed course and introduced the Apple Pencil for iPad Pro, which it refers to as a creative tool for scribbling, sketching, annotating and editing.
Apple Pencil features a pointed tip with highly responsive sensors that allow for precise input down to a single pixel. To achieve this, Apple engineered the Apple Pencil and iPad Pro display to work together to detect position, force and tilt.
For example, as seen in the video below, you can press lightly for a thinner stroke, or press harder for a darker, bolder stroke. Likewise, you can draw with the Apple Pencil on an angle to produce broad, shaded strokes.
The iPad Pro's subsystem scans the Apple Pencil's signal 240 times per second, providing the tablet with twice the data points it would normally collect for a finger. This results in the Apple Pencil being very responsive, with almost indistinguishable latency, as seen in TechCrunch's hands-on video below.
Apple Pencil has a built-in rechargeable battery that lasts up to 12 hours on a single charge, but more interesting is its ability to gain 30 minutes of battery life from just 15 seconds of charging. A magnetic cap hides a male Lightning connector that allows the Apple Pencil to be plugged into the iPad Pro to charge.
Apple Pencil will be available in November for $99 alongside the new Smart Keyboard. While the Apple Pencil is officially compatible with the iPad Pro, it remains to be seen if the tool will work with older iPads as a traditional stylus.
Article Link: Apple Pencil Offers High Precision and Low Latency, Gains 30 Minutes of Use From 15-Second Charge
Next year Apple will introduce the new Pencil 2. Yeah, Apple will have re-invented the #2 Pencil
This seems to me a stop-gap technology. 3D Touch should cover everything this Apple Pencil does, but without the need for an expensive proprietary stylus.
All that's needed in a higher scan speed sensor in 3D Touch screens.
All that's needed in a higher scan speed sensor in 3D Touch screens.
But not everyone will be buying the pro to use with the Pencil, so you'll get people complaining they're forced to buy a $100 pencil they don't want or need.
Android fanboys can shut the hell up about the stylus.
Because there's not a single crappy Android tablet that has a pen that's pressure sensitive AND precise (that tip radius) AND tilt sensitive.
Not one single option out there, for any price, from any manufacturer.
And when they come to imitate Apple, it will be typical Android quality: spec sheet marvels that don't work as intended.
LOL.
$100 bucks for a pressure sensitive, small radius, and tilt sensitive stylus is what?
It's the cheapest option on the market.
And it's not from a junky manufacturer.
Because there's not a single crappy Android tablet that has a pen that's pressure sensitive AND precise (that tip radius) AND tilt sensitive.
Not one single option out there, for any price, from any manufacturer.
And when they come to imitate Apple, it will be typical Android quality: spec sheet marvels that don't work as intended.
LOL.
$100 bucks for a pressure sensitive, small radius, and tilt sensitive stylus is what?
It's the cheapest option on the market.
And it's not from a junky manufacturer.
To those inquiring as to why it needs to be charged: you're right, pressure sensitivity has nothing to do with the stylus and everything to do with the screen (see 3DTouch and its ability to capture pressure down to the pixel).
However, because the point of the stylus is round, the screen would have no idea at what angle you're using the stylus and if you change doing so.
tl;dr: charging it is for its gyroscope, so that it can tell the iPad its angle.
Edit: okay, so I'm lying. There are actually pressure sensors in the device itself. Are they needed? No, not if the screen can sense pinpoint pressures accurately enough. But does it allow for a more custom experience? Yes. And there're actually 2 tilt sensors in the thing too. So quite a bit of tech to give a fairly thorough replication of the drawing/writing experience.
Is it worth $100? Not to me, but surely to a lot of people it will be.
However, because the point of the stylus is round, the screen would have no idea at what angle you're using the stylus and if you change doing so.
tl;dr: charging it is for its gyroscope, so that it can tell the iPad its angle.
Edit: okay, so I'm lying. There are actually pressure sensors in the device itself. Are they needed? No, not if the screen can sense pinpoint pressures accurately enough. But does it allow for a more custom experience? Yes. And there're actually 2 tilt sensors in the thing too. So quite a bit of tech to give a fairly thorough replication of the drawing/writing experience.
Is it worth $100? Not to me, but surely to a lot of people it will be.
Last edited:
