'Paper' Aims to Be The Ultimate iPad Sketchbook

[ThunderSkunk]

Wouldn't Inkpad be in a different category as it is a vector drawing app?
Pages is not vector based, so you souldn't compare it Inkpad. Each excels in it's category.

They were different categories at first, but in looking for a general sketching app, we sort of drifted from raster apps to settling on Adobe Ideas, which, while technically a vector app, behaves like a basic raster App. Can't make selections on the object level, has a raster eraser instead of delete, moves & scales by layer, etc... we used it for about a year til we started playing around with vector apps, but found most heavily burdened by busy UIs and clunky commands. Inkpad seems to have the best balance between a fast, clean, minimalist UI and powerful drawing tools.

+ being able to import/export .pngs with trans backgrounds AND .svg to/from CAD (& illustrator) via dropbox makes everything from sketching comps to tweaking actual design geometry wundebar.

I should be getting paid, I'd make a pretty good shill.

 

[Amazing Iceman]

They were different categories at first, but in looking for a general sketching app, we sort of drifted from raster apps to settling on Adobe Ideas, which, while technically a vector app, behaves like a basic raster App. Can't make selections on the object level, has a raster eraser instead of delete, moves & scales by layer, etc... we used it for about a year til we started playing around with vector apps, but found most heavily burdened by busy UIs and clunky commands. Inkpad seems to have the best balance between a fast, clean, minimalist UI and powerful drawing tools.

+ being able to import/export .pngs with trans backgrounds AND .svg to/from CAD (& illustrator) via dropbox makes everything from sketching comps to tweaking actual design geometry wundebar.

I should be getting paid, I'd make a pretty good shill.

Heheh! I use InkPad for vector graphics such as logos, etc.

'Paper' caught my attention due to its simplicity, and fast and easy ink flow, but the primary turndown to me was the lack of Dropbox integration. it's nice to have Facebook integration, but at this time it would be useless to me.

Autodesk is going to release very soon Sketchbook Ink, which is a vector drawing app that behaves like raster. Hopefully it will work as good as we expect it.

 

[Yujenisis]

Paper is beautifully designed, but as others have said it is not without flaws (particularly around glitchy multi-touch gestures).

At least on my iPad 3rd Generation, the ink was considerably less laggy than AutoDesk SketchBook Pro.

I do wish the extra pens were a bit cheaper. It's a little steep to buy the whole set for more than the cost of other more sophisticated drawing/note apps. With a few updates Paper could be pretty fantastic.

 

[notabadname]

Already Deleted

Hate this type of business model. The App is essentially useless with one brush and one eraser and one small selection of colors. Then everything you touch - "I want my $2.00"

If your product is so good, then sell it for the actual cost to use the fully featured product. If it is worth the price, the reviews will still be great and it will succeed.

Try Art Studio if you haven't. I can't think of anything this would do that AS doesn't. Very polished and incredibly capable.

 

[Beedough]

To everyone complaining about $8.00:

I challenge you to go out and buy a sketchbook, 9 pencils, 9 fountain ink pens, 18 markers, 8 tubes of paint and an eraser for under $8.00.

Side note:

Here are two of my creations using Paper http://beedough.tumblr.com/

 

[GoCubsGo]

I simply love the app. I did pay $8.00 for the brushes but I wish the color palate were bigger. I've blown $10 before on worse things.

 

[jackc]

To everyone complaining about $8.00:

I challenge you to go out and buy a sketchbook, 9 pencils, 9 fountain ink pens, 18 markers, 8 tubes of paint and an eraser for under $8.00.

It's not a sketchbook, 9 pencils, 9 fountain ink pens, 18 markers, 8 tubes of paint and an eraser. It's an app, with lots of competition. I don't think $8.00 is that excessive, but I probably won't buy it because of the alternatives.

 

[StuddedLeather]

I really like the video. Great marketing if all else fails.

 

[Bevz]

I noted the stylus in the video so checked out their website where they have this to say "we recommend using a stylus." - I keep thinking of that steve jobs quote "If you see a stylus, they blew it"... I won't even mention the laughably cynical use of in-app purchases to get people to download a "free" app just to keep it visible in the charts when the app really cost £5.49 (assuming you want to use it for anything!)... Ah, sorry, wasn't gonna mention that...

Looks pretty though, i'll give them that much

 

[Designx]

Not Convinced

I've bought these apps and none of them really imitate the real feeling of painting or drawing. I'm an artist and paint for a living. If I want to get quick ideas I use a pen and a scrap of paper. I never expected my ipad would be an accomplished creative sketching medium. In reality give me a free app with a 4 x 4 pixel black dot to draw with and nothing else. All the other gimmicks like "watercolor" or "pastel" are a joke and don't even look or work like the real thing. I have Painter 10 and that is just as bad.

 

[malnar]

Man, I think people are really, really missing the point here. The app, as-is, is a free demo with no time limit. Use it to see if you like it. If not, delete and move on with your life. If you do, you may wish to buy one of the options - or you can still use it as-is. I don't get the hand-wringing going on here. The option would be them charging $7.99 for this and a bunch of people being mad because they paid for something that doesn't do what they want it to do. For free, you can find out if it fits your life and needs or not. No need to get panties a-wadded.

 

[nutmac]

I challenge you to go out and buy a sketchbook, 9 pencils, 9 fountain ink pens, 18 markers, 8 tubes of paint and an eraser for under $8.00.

You can't compare the price of physical objects to software. Too many variance in capabilities and materials.

To me, it is not that $8 is expensive. But based on what it is capable of today, and with noticeable input lag on certain drawing tools, I find it hard to justify spending $8. As it stands, it is an interesting demonstration of what minimal UI can potentially do.

I noted the stylus in the video so checked out their website where they have this to say "we recommend using a stylus." - I keep thinking of that steve jobs quote "If you see a stylus, they blew it"...

But this is a drawing app and it isn't like stylus is required. They are simply recommending a stylus for maximum usability.

 

[charlituna]

It was interesting to hear Phil Schiller's comments after AutoDesk's Sketchbook Ink presentation at the iPad 3 keynote: "Using your finger to draw with vectors on the high res display is amazing etc."

We get it Phil: the stylus does not exist.

don't put words in his mouth.

Apple is not anti stylus. If you want to use it fine. But they want all things to work just as well for those that are using a finger as those using a stylus. Otherwise it makes the stylus mandatory and Steve/Apple are very against that.

As for this app. I tried it and frankly I wasn't blown away. It wasn't any better than a dozen other sketching apps that I have tried. Especially given that I have to buy the pens etc and you can bet that they will continue that for a good 95% of whatever they add. I'd rather pay $4.99 or even $9.99 and get everything they currently have AND whatever they add in the future.

 

[Shorties]

Bring up a drawing or painting app, now draw wavy lines around in your app fast, look at the curves, you should notice that they are not curves at all, but actually straight lines. Unless you draw slower you cannot achieve a curved line, this renders quick sketches useless.

I don't know why you assume I'm confusing it with a Galaxy Note, that already has stylus support and varying pressure levels which it supports. Were I assuming it were a Galaxy Note, I would not be wishing for these features, (As it would already have them) and I wouldn't be posting about them in a News Feature about an iPad app.

Also with the screen lag, draw something and you can see it being painted onto the screen quite some distance behind your finger, this ruins the whole experience.

I am annoyed that Benjy is being downvoted so much, he is absolutely right the 100ms of delay between touch and response is a huge issue with modern capacitive touch screens, preventing them from truly replicating pen and paper. Check out Microsoft's solution and comparison: http://www.engadget.com/2012/03/10/microsoft-cuts-touchscreen-lag-to-1ms/

 

[zarusoba]

I take you're point: they're not anti-stylus and my comment was rash. But they passively oppose styli by not including support for them in iOS.

They are now marketing iPad as a content creation device for artists. The AutoDesk and Brushes demos prove that. There have been some brilliant finger-painting demos, but artists do prefer a stylus.

The third party stylus solutions, while often ingenious, are compromised at best, and at worst unuseable in terms of a natural drawing experience, which reflects poorly on iPad.

don't put words in his mouth.

Apple is not anti stylus. If you want to use it fine. But they want all things to work just as well for those that are using a finger as those using a stylus. Otherwise it makes the stylus mandatory and Steve/Apple are very against that.

As for this app. I tried it and frankly I wasn't blown away. It wasn't any better than a dozen other sketching apps that I have tried. Especially given that I have to buy the pens etc and you can bet that they will continue that for a good 95% of whatever they add. I'd rather pay $4.99 or even $9.99 and get everything they currently have AND whatever they add in the future.

 

[zarusoba]

It's an impressive video. I wonder when that tech might make it into a real product...

I am annoyed that Benjy is being downvoted so much, he is absolutely right the 100ms of delay between touch and response is a huge issue with modern capacitive touch screens, preventing them from truly replicating pen and paper. Check out Microsoft's solution and comparison: http://www.engadget.com/2012/03/10/microsoft-cuts-touchscreen-lag-to-1ms/

 

[Shorties]

It's an impressive video. I wonder when that tech might make it into a real product...

Yeah I don't know, it seems that Microsoft's approach uses a projector, which would be in line with their Microsoft Surface technology, and not necessarily ready for tablets just yet. I do hope to see improved response times as a selling point in the near future though, it's a pretty big issue that I think more people would notice once it was improved. And open the use of the tablets up to even more possibilities.

 

[Derpage]

Drawing software is a moot point until the resolution of the touch area is raised to a point where any ammount of detail can be done. Zooming in and out works for a while, but for the most part, you just can't get enough tracking out of the screen to properly track a stylus. Wacom owns pretty much all the pertinent patents to the technology which could really make the tablet a good art device.

 

[zarusoba]

Samsung has licensed Wacom tech for the Galaxy Note. Had a chance to try it at all? (I haven't).

Drawing software is a moot point until the resolution of the touch area is raised to a point where any ammount of detail can be done. Zooming in and out works for a while, but for the most part, you just can't get enough tracking out of the screen to properly track a stylus. Wacom owns pretty much all the pertinent patents to the technology which could really make the tablet a good art device.

----------

Apparently Procreate has no lag [or at least no noticeable lag?] due to its being built around iPad's GPU rather than CPU.

Yeah I don't know, it seems that Microsoft's approach uses a projector, which would be in line with their Microsoft Surface technology, and not necessarily ready for tablets just yet. I do hope to see improved response times as a selling point in the near future though, it's a pretty big issue that I think more people would notice once it was improved. And open the use of the tablets up to even more possibilities.

 

[Derpage]

Samsung has licensed Wacom tech for the Galaxy Note. Had a chance to try it at all? (I haven't).




----------

Apparently Procreate has no lag [or at least no noticeable lag?] due to its being built around iPad's GPU rather than CPU.

I haven't. The tech is coming to the Galaxy Tab 10.1 so I'll probably give it a look on the larger format.

 

[zarusoba]

Yes I'm interested in the larger format too. I believe it's the Galaxy Note 10.1, rather than the Tab.

A friend of mine was one of the caricaturists at the Galaxy Note launch here in Sydney. She wasn't all that impressed, but she's a Cintiq user. The Note has only 256 levels of pressure sensitivity.

The thing about Android though is the lack of art apps as compared to iOS.

I haven't. The tech is coming to the Galaxy Tab 10.1 so I'll probably give it a look on the larger format.

 

[Derpage]

Yes I'm interested in the larger format too. I believe it's the Galaxy Note 10.1, rather than the Tab.

A friend of mine was one of the caricaturists at the Galaxy Note launch here in Sydney. She wasn't all that impressed, but she's a Cintiq user. The Note has only 256 levels of pressure sensitivity.

The thing about Android though is the lack of art apps as compared to iOS.

Ah, yeah. I thought it was just going to be in all the Tabs. I really don't consider any of the apps available for either IOS or Android to be anything more than novelty at the moment, but if the hardware were to arise with the proper input resolution, I'd give them more consideration for an actual workflow of some sort.

 

[charlituna]

I take you're point: they're not anti-stylus and my comment was rash. But they passively oppose styli by not including support for them in iOS.

So because they don't use an active digitizer or other form of pressure sensitive screen and/or put a stylus in the box, you think they don't include support. Good to know exactly where you stand even if it is way out in left field.

 

[iSee]

What's up with the MR ad for Paper?!?

Anyway, I'm trying to find the "perfect" diagram-pad/notepad (for me), so I was happy to see a quality contender. From my perspective, when I take notes I jot down only main ideas, words, or numbers but when brainstorming or thinking I like to sketch diagrams a lot.

Here's my mini review -- as shorthand, I compare often to penultimate, the current best (but not perfect) overall app:
* The tools are great. The choices are very well thought out and implemented. The only problem I have is they are not quite as responsive as I'd like (and not quite as responsive as penultimate). I'm on an iPad 1, though, so you might do better on iPad 2 or later. $8 is acceptable for these high-quality tools.
* I love the blank-piece of paper idea. (My biggest complaint about penultimate is how much screen real-estate is wasted on non-drawing area stuff. However, the UI is surprisingly fiddly. Seems like the palette should go away when you select a tool or color (except the eraser maybe). And the gesture to bring it up doesn't always work -- instead you leave inadvertent marks on your page... which are a pain to get rid of because the rewind (undo) feature is awkward to say the least.
* The color palette is a crime. I'm perfectly OK with 9 total color choices, but why those 9 colors???
* I love the look and navigation of journal screen where you choose among your different notebooks.
edit: meant to add:
* needs wrist protection like penultimate and others. I basically can't comfortably use parts of the screen. Also, I wouldn't mind select & move like penultimate. It's not a deal breaker, but it's so useful when I run out of room when making a diagram... of course other solutions to the problem (unbounded paper size?) would work too.

The verdict: I'll stick with penultimate for now. (I do wish it had a variety of high-quality tools and would devote more screen space to the drawable area like Paper.

 

[zarusoba]

I'm talking about software support for pressure sensitive styli written into the iOS, like the way it's included in Android Ice Cream Sandwich.

I wouldn't expect Apple to put a stylus in the box: I don't even think that would be a good idea.

Pressure sensitive screens? I'm not aware of any. Wacom tech uses pressure sensitive styli.

So because they don't use an active digitizer or other form of pressure sensitive screen and/or put a stylus in the box, you think they don't include support. Good to know exactly where you stand even if it is way out in left field.