[Steve]

Wacom, the leading manufacturer of pen tablets and interactive pen displays, today announces an update to the entry-level Volito2 pen tablet.

ArtRage2 is designed to provide a realistic and fun simulation of using paint on a canvas, along with pens, pencils, crayons, and other tools. In combination with the Volito2 pen tablet the user can take full advantage of the pressure sensitivity support of these drawing tools to create a realistic painting feel. The Volito2 pen has 512 levels of pressure sensitivity, offering a natural experience when working with the painting tools.

In order to make the software available as soon as possible, Wacom is offering an online software update for all new Volito2 consumers from October 2006. ArtRage2 can be downloaded via the bonus software programme by entering the code provided with the product.

ArtRage2 – new features and functionality
ArtRage2 offers several new tools, but still retains its easy-to-use, intuitive menu interface. With this version, the number of realistic tools has almost doubled and consists of, for example, the eraser, pencil, oil paint, crayon, chalk, felt pen and palette knife.

Additional tools provided include:

• Airbrush - enables the user to spray smooth strokes on to the canvas, allows the paint to build up in one spot or creates dagger stroke tapering lines.
• Glitter gun – thousands of tiny sparkles can be sprinkled with this new metallic paint option.
• Paint roller – users can lay down smooth, solid bands of colour with thick or thin paint.
• Paint tube – a never-ending tube of oil paint that can be squeezed out onto the canvas into a large blob, which can then be smeared for effect.
• Colour sampler – enables the user to sample colour directly from the canvas or reference images.


Providing a more advanced touch, ArtRage2 now enables images to be created with the use of layers. Multiple, transparent layers can be added and each layer is separate from the last so that the paint will not blend when applied. The texture of the paint strokes however, will still show through. Each layer has its own paper properties and can be moved and merged with others.

There is also now a tracing images feature, which enables the user to load an image such as a photograph and overlay it on the canvas as a guide for painting. If required, ArtRage2 will automatically choose the colour to use as paint. The software can also be used to load an image and pin it to the canvas as a painting reference. These images can then be moved, scaled and rotated in any way required.

A final example of a new feature of ArtRage2 is Metallic Paint, which makes every tool apply metal to the canvas including gold leaf and sparkly metal glitter. This can also be smeared and blended with non-metallic paint, providing a new sheen. The canvas can easily be turned into tin foil too.

Availability and pricing
Volito2 is available now from Computers Unlimited priced at £39.99 including VAT.

[Steve]

Does anyone use a tablet and pen for their image editing and if so how useful do you find it?

[Toonie]

Steve

I've been using a Wacom for about four years & don't know how other people manage without one. The pen gets used for about 90% of all my computer tasks. I couldn't go back to just a mouse. For accurate selection work the pen is just unbeatable & the wacom mouse is cordless & like the pen uses no batteries plus it has a scroll wheel

[stepheno]

I've been using the Wacom 2 for about 6 months. Mine didn't come boxed with the Artrage software. You can read my review in Equipment Reviews.

[Dabhand16]

I have a Trust A4 tablet (reviewed in the equipment/review forum). I find it very useful, and use it in combination with the mouse, depending on what i'm doing.

before I bought it, I was torn between A4 or A5 sizes. I eventually decided on the Trust A4 as the Wacom A4 was so much more expensive, and the physical size of the A4 v A5 was not great. The Wacom is probably a better tablet, but I went for the Trust as it was much better value for my use.

Now I think that the A5 size would be OK, but A6 might be just adequate/too small to achieve easy and accurate use, but would be better than a mouse.