Paperless sketching - iPad Pro and Apple Pencil's Story

Since the launch of the hardware last year in Oct 2015, there have been many positive reviews by users all over the world. My rating for the Apple Pencil and the technology behind it: Awesome, and a 5 Stars rating. I am always attracted to the ease of use of a new hardware. In this case, all you need to do to connect the Apple Pencil to the iPad Pro is by sticking the Pencil's rear end into the charging port. There is no need for syncing to be done. There is no calibration. The Apple Pencil works like a charm with Procreate once the app is activated.




I have tested other devices with their styluses. None works as well as Apple Pencil, when comes to drawing hairline or getting the lightest tonal value with the paint brush or pencil brush. When I need to draw a very thin line, I am barely laying any pressure on the Pencil. To get a thicker line, I am pressing down with a proportionate pressure, just like using a real brush or a flex pen, sometimes depending on the brushes' settings or how well the brush tools were created in the first place. But for thin lines, no problem.



Palm rejection with Procreate is great, almost perfect. To ensure good palm rejection while drawing with the app, I have to place my palm on the screen first before I begin putting in the first mark. There are times my palm and the tip of the Pencil touch the screen at the same time, Procreate will register as UNDO. Though the issue is not serious, sometime a large portion of the drawing may suddenly disappear. I could click the REDO button, but most of the time, I just redraw. This happens whenever I draw too fast.



There are many paper size settings in Procreate we can choose from. I particularly like the long format. It gives me more freedom to draw a scene, whether I am drawing a landscape or people. Most especially for drawing a landscape, in which the viewer is allowed to span his vision across the drawing, like surveying a scene in person. Drawing on the long format is like opening up a sketchbook and drawing on a double page spread.