5 ms·

Am I the only one who wants a pen which writes like a pencil, not vice-versa, maybe I'm crazy... edit for typo.

Groxx 16y ago
As in, varied shades? Try a Bic, you can actually sketch pretty well with them. I don't know what they do differently, but they're the only pens I've found with this quality. If you mean erasability (sp?), that's pretty un-pen-like in its very nature, though they exist. If you mean something else, you've got me intrigued: can haz illumination, plz?
- benofsky 16y ago
  I don't do any drawing actually, I just don't think there is anything as fluid for taking notes, diagrams, mindmaps, etc.
  - Groxx 16y ago
    Probably not. I'm also a pencil fan, though I've fiddled with other tools, and have a decent Wacom. The Wacom could replace most other tools... if there were any decent high-volume + organization sketching applications out there with proper tablet support. It's very nice, and I'd love to have all my notes in my computer, but things don't keep up or they look like crap or they have no tablet support or they provide zero tools for sketchers who use sketching as a form of memory.
    - olefoo 16y ago
      > decent high-volume + organization sketching applications What makes for 'decent' in your terminology? Obviously the primary organization tool is going to be the timeline, but what other organization tools do you feel a need for? tags? contacts? would it need to be able to pull text out of a sketch? You mention high-volume; what do most sketching apps you've met do that limits the speed and volume of creation?
      - Groxx 16y ago
        I've poked around with a number of the Big apps (from Adobe, Alias, etc), and at least a couple dozen smaller attempts. The big ones usually keep up with my drawing speed, have nice pressure sensing, mediocre-to-decent pencil emulation (Adobe is particularly good, though struggles to keep up at times), and overall proper support for a tablet. They also come with squat for organization: you're basically just dealing with files in folders. I can do that in any application; I'm looking for something which myself and artists would actually use. The vast majority of people I've seen using applications like these launch the files from Explorer: utter failure of the application to organize the files better, in other words. The small ones come in all sorts of flavors, but thus far they've all failed on the organization front entirely if they support tablets, and are fairly weak attempts in ones that don't. For instance: I know of one which lets you browse larger thumbnails with more detail and a more dense display than I can manage in my file browsers. I know of none which support both tablets and tags. Heck, I'd settle for a cover-flow-like interface if it loaded quickly, but the only place that exists is in Finder. Surely a specialized application can do better and show more relevant info, given that it can make cached data. Text in a sketch is, yes, very important, and has the upside of making it searchable: but again, I have yet to see one which lets you search across (a) folder(s), much less any other method of organization. Thumbnails are uniformly full-'page' thumbnails: not informative at all for brainstorming sketches, as they're usually lighter and have more sparse info. Usually, it's a large break in one's flow to create a new page to draw on; Alias' Sketchbook Pro did this decently, if I remember correctly. But no others do, unless they're super-restricted sticky-note clones. They're all: file -> new -> dimensions + background color + alpha channel + color system + would you like a goat with that? Surely this can be chosen post-mortem if it really matters (unlikely for sketchers). Default to a transparent sketching layer + a background color layer, so it can be separated if I decide I want to copy my drawings but not the background. There are a couple decent infinite-canvas programs out there, but I have yet to see them in any pro-user apps, just for the low end of amateurs who want something restrictingly simplistic (nice, sometimes, and some of them are excellent, but then we're back to file management). Tools are often Photoshop clones: tiny, fixed position, and require you to go across the screen to change basic properties. They also take up space. We've got gestures on our trackpads, but extremely few drawing applications make use of any kind of gesture (a few radial menus, but usually they're "dumb" with poor feedback and zero adapting for slightly off / too far / too short aim, especially ignoring pressure with a tablet). Which is particularly strange when you consider all the gesture tools for mice, and then squat with a tablet. ----- I should write a blog entry / post some of my more-developed thoughts on this. I'm a little bitter :) I'm also an application-testing-extremist, and I'm very likely reaching 10k applications across two OSs (many short-term, yes, but I've been at it for 15 years), so large-scale oversights / annoyances across entire genres which are solved in others bug me. If you know of any sketching / drawing applications, I'd be more than happy to try them out, I've been away from them for a year or two and have no doubt missed hundreds I've never heard of.
  - alextgordon 16y ago
    I have a Uniball Vision Elite and it's by far the smoothest writing implement I've used. I can't say it's anything like a pencil, but if it's fluidity you're after, that's your pen.
- joezydeco 16y ago
  Pens don't have that same gritty resistance on paper like a pencil. And although most don't do this, you can buy pencils in varying degrees of "hardness" beyond the #2 you've been using since grade school.
  - billswift 16y ago
    I like F and HB grades, they are soft enough to make a much darker line, but don't smear anywhere near as bad as the B-grades. Another advantage of softer grades like F is that you don't have to press as hard to get a dark line, so they are easier to erase. I did 2 years of drafting in high school and worked as an architectural draftsman in the late 1980s. I have used everything from 9H - very, very hard lead for making fine guidelines, to 6B very soft for messy sketching.
    - joezydeco 16y ago
      You know, I took a mechanical drawing class and I loved it. Wasn't required for my CS curriculum, but just playing with the tools and making these precise drawings was a joy. They eventually switched that class to AutoCAD only. Pity.
sliverstorm 16y ago
My biggest complain when it comes to writing with a pen is the thickness of the lines. I'm a huge fan of 0.5mm lead for that reason. If that's your qualm, take a look at finer pointed pens- step outside the ball point.
- shrikant 16y ago
  I find the 0.5mm leads break way to easily - personally prefer the 0.7mm variety a whole lot better. Especially when it comes to shading in those little boxes while taking tests and filling OMR forms :-)
- packetslave 16y ago
  Check out some of the 0.25mm and 0.18mm (!) pens available from Japan. Really, really fine-lined pens are something of a fetish there. jetpens.com sells a bunch of Japan-only imported pens and other writing tools.

Groxx 16y ago

As in, varied shades? Try a Bic, you can actually sketch pretty well with them. I don't know what they do differently, but they're the only pens I've found with this quality. If you mean erasability (sp?), that's pretty un-pen-like in its very nature, though they exist. If you mean something else, you've got me intrigued: can haz illumination, plz?

benofsky 16y ago
I don't do any drawing actually, I just don't think there is anything as fluid for taking notes, diagrams, mindmaps, etc.
- Groxx 16y ago
  Probably not. I'm also a pencil fan, though I've fiddled with other tools, and have a decent Wacom. The Wacom could replace most other tools... if there were any decent high-volume + organization sketching applications out there with proper tablet support. It's very nice, and I'd love to have all my notes in my computer, but things don't keep up or they look like crap or they have no tablet support or they provide zero tools for sketchers who use sketching as a form of memory.
  - olefoo 16y ago
    > decent high-volume + organization sketching applications What makes for 'decent' in your terminology? Obviously the primary organization tool is going to be the timeline, but what other organization tools do you feel a need for? tags? contacts? would it need to be able to pull text out of a sketch? You mention high-volume; what do most sketching apps you've met do that limits the speed and volume of creation?
    - Groxx 16y ago
      I've poked around with a number of the Big apps (from Adobe, Alias, etc), and at least a couple dozen smaller attempts. The big ones usually keep up with my drawing speed, have nice pressure sensing, mediocre-to-decent pencil emulation (Adobe is particularly good, though struggles to keep up at times), and overall proper support for a tablet. They also come with squat for organization: you're basically just dealing with files in folders. I can do that in any application; I'm looking for something which myself and artists would actually use. The vast majority of people I've seen using applications like these launch the files from Explorer: utter failure of the application to organize the files better, in other words. The small ones come in all sorts of flavors, but thus far they've all failed on the organization front entirely if they support tablets, and are fairly weak attempts in ones that don't. For instance: I know of one which lets you browse larger thumbnails with more detail and a more dense display than I can manage in my file browsers. I know of none which support both tablets and tags. Heck, I'd settle for a cover-flow-like interface if it loaded quickly, but the only place that exists is in Finder. Surely a specialized application can do better and show more relevant info, given that it can make cached data. Text in a sketch is, yes, very important, and has the upside of making it searchable: but again, I have yet to see one which lets you search across (a) folder(s), much less any other method of organization. Thumbnails are uniformly full-'page' thumbnails: not informative at all for brainstorming sketches, as they're usually lighter and have more sparse info. Usually, it's a large break in one's flow to create a new page to draw on; Alias' Sketchbook Pro did this decently, if I remember correctly. But no others do, unless they're super-restricted sticky-note clones. They're all: file -> new -> dimensions + background color + alpha channel + color system + would you like a goat with that? Surely this can be chosen post-mortem if it really matters (unlikely for sketchers). Default to a transparent sketching layer + a background color layer, so it can be separated if I decide I want to copy my drawings but not the background. There are a couple decent infinite-canvas programs out there, but I have yet to see them in any pro-user apps, just for the low end of amateurs who want something restrictingly simplistic (nice, sometimes, and some of them are excellent, but then we're back to file management). Tools are often Photoshop clones: tiny, fixed position, and require you to go across the screen to change basic properties. They also take up space. We've got gestures on our trackpads, but extremely few drawing applications make use of any kind of gesture (a few radial menus, but usually they're "dumb" with poor feedback and zero adapting for slightly off / too far / too short aim, especially ignoring pressure with a tablet). Which is particularly strange when you consider all the gesture tools for mice, and then squat with a tablet. ----- I should write a blog entry / post some of my more-developed thoughts on this. I'm a little bitter :) I'm also an application-testing-extremist, and I'm very likely reaching 10k applications across two OSs (many short-term, yes, but I've been at it for 15 years), so large-scale oversights / annoyances across entire genres which are solved in others bug me. If you know of any sketching / drawing applications, I'd be more than happy to try them out, I've been away from them for a year or two and have no doubt missed hundreds I've never heard of.
- alextgordon 16y ago
  I have a Uniball Vision Elite and it's by far the smoothest writing implement I've used. I can't say it's anything like a pencil, but if it's fluidity you're after, that's your pen.
joezydeco 16y ago
Pens don't have that same gritty resistance on paper like a pencil. And although most don't do this, you can buy pencils in varying degrees of "hardness" beyond the #2 you've been using since grade school.
- billswift 16y ago
  I like F and HB grades, they are soft enough to make a much darker line, but don't smear anywhere near as bad as the B-grades. Another advantage of softer grades like F is that you don't have to press as hard to get a dark line, so they are easier to erase. I did 2 years of drafting in high school and worked as an architectural draftsman in the late 1980s. I have used everything from 9H - very, very hard lead for making fine guidelines, to 6B very soft for messy sketching.
  - joezydeco 16y ago
    You know, I took a mechanical drawing class and I loved it. Wasn't required for my CS curriculum, but just playing with the tools and making these precise drawings was a joy. They eventually switched that class to AutoCAD only. Pity.

sliverstorm 16y ago

My biggest complain when it comes to writing with a pen is the thickness of the lines. I'm a huge fan of 0.5mm lead for that reason. If that's your qualm, take a look at finer pointed pens- step outside the ball point.

shrikant 16y ago
I find the 0.5mm leads break way to easily - personally prefer the 0.7mm variety a whole lot better. Especially when it comes to shading in those little boxes while taking tests and filling OMR forms :-)
packetslave 16y ago
Check out some of the 0.25mm and 0.18mm (!) pens available from Japan. Really, really fine-lined pens are something of a fetish there. jetpens.com sells a bunch of Japan-only imported pens and other writing tools.