CharleyL
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 p.2 #2 · Computer mouse - what do you use? | |
Those of you that are sold on different designs of mice, do you edit photos with them? You really should try a graphics tablet, before you lock yourself into using any kind of mouse for photo editing. An artist would never use something like a mouse to create artwork. They would use a selection of brushes and pens for artwork. Why try to do photo art or editing using something as big and clumsy as a computer mouse, or in my previous post, a hockey puck?
A good graphics tablet uses a wireless pen and when you place it near or on the graphics tablet, your motion becomes 1-1 with the screen curser, meaning that the range of the graphics tablet is also the range of the screen. There are side buttons on the pen, so you can command different functions as you would with a mouse, but you have the positioning accuracy of the pen to the screen much like a pencil to a sheet of paper. You can actually sign your name with one, and it will look on the screen as if you had somehow used a pen or pencil on the screen. Most have pressure capability that changes the width of the line by changing the pressure that you apply to the pen tip. The opposite end, like the eraser on a pencil, erases just like a pencil eraser, also with pressure sensitive capability, when using a photo program or any other graphics program. You can choose brushes through the graphics program selections to paint patterns or brush lines with it too. A mouse is great for most computer programs, to make selections, but when you start editing photos or creating artwork on a computer, you really can't get the accuracy, not the brush effects for artwork like you can qith a graphics tablet.
Find someone or some place that has a graphics tablet and see if they will give you a demonstration or better yet, let you try it.
25 years ago I was doing a demonstration of photo editing on my computer, and was setting up for the demonstration, doing tests of all of what I would need to use in the demonstration. To assure that my graphics program (Photoshop 7.1) was working and the tablet was controlling it, I had a blank white page on the display and was using the graphics tablet to draw a house with a picket fence in front of it. Nothing fancy, just a line drawing, but with varying width lines to check the pen pressure function, and erasing with the back end of the pen. All of a sudden, a young girl walking by yelled out "He's drawing on the computer !!!!), and many people turned to see what I was drawing. So I let her come up and try it for herself, showing her how to make narrow and wide lines, how to select different colors and patterns, and how to erase small areas. I let her play for about 15 minutes before I needed to take back control and set up for the demonstration, but she had drawn quite a crowd, and many were asking me how the graphics tablet worked and how much it cost. I probably could have sold a couple of dozen of them, but I wasn't there to sell anything and only had the one. I've upgraded 4 times since then.
I still use a mouse, sometimes, but do most everything using the pen on the graphics tablet. You don't need to give up your precious mouse. Both the tablet and the mouse can be connected at the same time. Use either one, depending on what you are doing. Just remember not to move the mouse when using the tablet or the tablet pen when using the mouse, because the motion of the one being used will be affected by the motion of the other.
Charley
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