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Jony Ive on Apple Pencil: A 'Natural' and 'Familiar' Extension of Traditional Drawing Tools
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Calling it a stylus evokes horrible memories of the Newton. The Apple Pencil is much more like a MS Surface Pen or Samsung S Pen.
Do you have an iPad Air 2 to test it with, just to confirm 100% that it doesn't work at all?
With the new Trackpad is one of the possibility. But I prefer the iPad Pro as an accessory for Macs. Just imagine Air Display or Duet Display (secondary display) apps which approved by Apple. Then enable input interactions with the Pencil. Now move that Mac Apps like a separate desktop for example Artboard, Inkscape, Corel Draw or Photoshop. Just imagine the possibilty this should be the bridge between Mac and iOS creativity. Not neglecting the other but rather to compliment each other.
I use Good Notes, which keeps my original scribbles but allows me to search on the text (and does surprisingly well). I suspect the secret might be that it is easier to answer the question "which scribbles look like they might be this word" instead of the question "what word is this scribble"?
You have horrible memories of the Newton?
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Real pencils have erasers on the back, because that is what is convenient for an actual, real pencil. But actual Pencils also have the relative disadvantage that the graphite point can't magically turn into rubber.
Not at all. You just seem fixated on a 19th century technology-bound methodology.
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Still remember the Doonesbury comics about early Newton handwriting recognition:Yep, that's why some of us got Android tablets with pens years ago. Except those are usually Wacom based, meaning no battery or charging needed.
The skeuomorphic value of using the eraser end would be high
But yes, many pens have a side button that turns the tip into an eraser without having to flip it end over end. Lots more convenient.
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Actually for me I can sign my name with my finger as well as I can with a pen. I know this because it's how I sign for parcels. The biggest issue with touch screens of yesteryear used in conjunction with a stylus is digitiser lag. It's abysmal and not something I'd like to 'get used to'. Apparently Apple's stylus is far better than the competition in this important regard. And for those looking for existing iPads to work with this stylus it's not going to happen as the iPad Pro has a new custom built digitiser that works in conjunction with the Pencil. If ever supported you'll need to iPad hardware regardless of size.
People who say "it's just a stylus" tend to be people who...
- Never tried it.
- Like to say "it's just ____" about Apple stuff without a fair try.
- Must believe that "doing something really well" is just "just the same" as "doing something less well." (People who avoid Apple have to think that a lot.)
- Must love bullet point specs. Features that are really good? Nah. Who cares. All that matters is the length of the list! "Stylus." "Check!" "Must be as good as an iPad Pro then!"
- Never tried it.
- Like to say "it's just ____" about Apple stuff without a fair try.
- Must believe that "doing something really well" is just "just the same" as "doing something less well." (People who avoid Apple have to think that a lot.)
- Must love bullet point specs. Features that are really good? Nah. Who cares. All that matters is the length of the list! "Stylus." "Check!" "Must be as good as an iPad Pro then!"
It was ... problematic. It had lag, the recognition wasn't up to par with the marketing until the last version, the screen and stylus felt too slippery together, and you needed to use way more pressure to get it to respond than was ever comfortable. (I owned one for a while). Palm OS did it better by giving you a simplistic character set to draw (and less force needed). Making the user learn was easier than making the computer "learn".
Yes, it makes a big difference in efficiency. You don't want to be toggling software or hardware switches for such a basic task. Making marks and erasing them are frequent basic tasks that should always be as quick and accessible as possible. Why do you think pencils come with erasers on them?
Some art pencil sets don't have erasers on the pencils, but then they are also accommodating different graphite types by way of entirely different pencils (something you don't need to do with a computer stylus), so the analogy breaks there in trying to justify NOT having an eraser on the Apple Pencil with "because not all pencils do!"
Apple is marketing themselves foolishly here by not having an eraser end on this "Pencil" and constantly talking about how pencil-like it is.
I guess I had a different experience, and maybe the years since I had it have fuzzed my memory. I do remember taking back the Palm I bought because I HATED the "have to write it in that lower area and remember how to do the shorthand". Different strokes for different folks, I suppose. I do remember that I worked in a clean room at the time, so bringing in paper was more difficult. (Clean room paper has issues with ink as well...)
I disagree with that last statement, as having an eraser on a standard Ticonderoga pencil is an ease of delivery issue. The other end of the pencil isn't really used for a purpose, so why not put the eraser there? For digital use, it's just a tap on the eraser icon and erase, and tap back to the virtual pencil to make it draw again. Also, putting the eraser at the other end of a digital pencil does involve a lot of design work.
If they do it, I'd have a double ended lightning cable go from the iPad Pro to a lightning connector on the Pencil, and also let it use standard lightning connectors for the charging. That plug it into the iPad Pro and have it stick out is a bit obtuse and not really Apple like as far as feng shui goes.
Apple Pencil = techno lust for me.
For those balking at the price, the Wacom Intuos (Bluetooth) Creative Stylus 1 was $100. (We bought 12 of them for a Creating with the iPad course I taught) and it used AAAA batteries (exasperating things) and was OK, but . . . . from the videos I've seen (e.g the Disney Periscope videos) the Pencil appears to be a superior product. I want one! (and the iPad Pro, of course.)
For those balking at the price, the Wacom Intuos (Bluetooth) Creative Stylus 1 was $100. (We bought 12 of them for a Creating with the iPad course I taught) and it used AAAA batteries (exasperating things) and was OK, but . . . . from the videos I've seen (e.g the Disney Periscope videos) the Pencil appears to be a superior product. I want one! (and the iPad Pro, of course.)
Good point. The regular pencil was designed like this as a tool answering to physical constraints. The Apple Pencil's constraints are bound only by software... which are virtually limitless. Also, real drawing pencils often don't have any eraser.
My only 3 gripes with the Apple Pencil are:
- There is no place to store the device securely on the iPad,
- There is nothing that can stop the device from rolling off an uneven surface and...
- I see the removable cap as easy to lose. Maybe they should have thought of a magnetic charging system that doesn't require removing a cap.
Maybe some Third Parties will invent decent solutions.
Sorry, not seeing the improvement in efficiency. Maybe if the eraser tool is off screen I guess? It's not efficient to me to flip the writing implement over, erase, then flip it back again. I guarantee you i can swap tools faster than you can flip the Pencil twice. Seems like needless duplication of functionality, especially when the Pencil has a more sophisticated active tip than most styluses.
The eraser helps more with something like a Wacom tablet, where it saves you from navigating to the tools or hitting a keyboard shortcut. You don't really have that hunting to do on a tablet (with a sanely written drawing app).
Please elaborate on the charging adapter ... can it be used as a cap? Does it have an indicator for charging status? Is it bi-directional or must be oriented one way? Is it a full data pass through, or will it only provide charging capability (not sure how one would test that exactly)?
When I did a lot of work with pencil and paper, I found it far more convenient to have a dedicated eraser laying next to my work surface. Drop the pencil, pick up the eraser. No twirling the pencil back and forth, though it could come in handy for fine detail erasing. And that's another point, the eraser would have to have as a fine a point as the tip, in order to erase with the same amount of control. So since that's the case, why not a simple toggle switch instead? That would be infinitely faster, and more practical under any circumstances. I hope Apple doesn't make the reverse an eraser.
Now a dual tipped pen with different sized, interchangeable tips would be awesome, once the charging is handled inductively via the magnetic keyboard contacts.
If you watch the videos, you can see the thing that makes this "Pencil" NOT a stylus...
It's the fact that sensors underneath the iPad Pro screen can detect whether the screen is being touched by a finger or stylus & act the standard way, or whether it is being touched by the pencil & react a completely different way. (palm rejection, lower latency, etc)
Unless you are under the opinion that a $99 item can somehow miraculously install these sensors under your current iPad screen... it is unclear what you are wishing for/imagining??
Yeah, I had the same gripe with the Livescribe pen. A $200 for a device that can be made irrelevant by gravity.
Correction... I guess it's weighted so it's like a public toilet paper dispenser...
(from here... iPad Pro Tidbits: A9X Outperforms MacBook, Apple Pencil is Weighted, T-Mobile Financing and More )
I guess I have to give Apple credit for this!
Re: "stylus" and "pen/pencil"...
I have a minor pet peeve about people using the words interchangeably.
The definition of a stylus is old as mankind: a stick used to draw with. When used with touch devices, it describes a simple blunt instrument pretending to be a finger.
OTOH, a pen is an active electronic device that, usually together with a dedicated surface, allows for detailed and accurate drawing.
Since everyone else on the planet uses "pen", Apple obviously chose "pencil" to differentiate themselves in the market, even if there's really nothing different about it, or anything pencil like (e.g. such as an eraser on the end).
As many are pointing out, if all you've ever experienced is a dumb stylus, a pen will be quite an upgrade. I'm glad Apple finally got around to offering one. Although, in years past I think they might've gone the extra step and made a "brush" instead, with individual active bristles. That would be so cool.
I have a minor pet peeve about people using the words interchangeably.
The definition of a stylus is old as mankind: a stick used to draw with. When used with touch devices, it describes a simple blunt instrument pretending to be a finger.
OTOH, a pen is an active electronic device that, usually together with a dedicated surface, allows for detailed and accurate drawing.
Since everyone else on the planet uses "pen", Apple obviously chose "pencil" to differentiate themselves in the market, even if there's really nothing different about it, or anything pencil like (e.g. such as an eraser on the end).
As many are pointing out, if all you've ever experienced is a dumb stylus, a pen will be quite an upgrade. I'm glad Apple finally got around to offering one. Although, in years past I think they might've gone the extra step and made a "brush" instead, with individual active bristles. That would be so cool.
Yes. It would have been completely natural IF THEY HAD INCLUDED THE DARN THING AT LAUNCH!
Ah, thanks for explaining it to me! I read that already but didn't quite understand the meaning (as English isn't my first language). Thanks again for clarifying!