A couple of days ago, I joined Tiffanie Mang's digital painting mentorship. I'm having a blast, it's awesome to be in a class of people that are super enthusiastic about painting. :)

Below are my first studies, from week 0.

I thought this was impossible, I thought that you’d need to lock the camera position and save it, so you could then go back to a different angle that was working for you.

It turns out you can easily undo (and redo) camera movements by using the square brackets keys, [ and ] respectively.

If only I had known sooner about this…

Let’s say you are animating a tail or something like that, and you need to select multiple curves, you can simple drag and select the curves, right? That can be a bit frustrating over time.

There’s multiple ways to automate this multi-selection, and yes, if you are using animBot you can do that, or you can simply open the Script Editor, select the curves you need, find the code generated for that selection, select it and drag and drop it on any Maya shelf.

But there’s another way:

1. Select all the curves you want.
2. Go to Create > Sets > Set.

You’ll notice that a new item will appear in the Outliner, you can rename it if you want.

To use, right click on it and Select Set Member.

And that’s all for today.

Cheers!

I found this quick tip super useful while I was watching a lecture from my Animation Mentor‘s mentorship.

Let’s say you want to add a shortcut for the Content Browser in one of the Maya shelves. Here’s what you need to do:

1. Select the desired shelf, for instance Custom.
2. Find the item you want to add the shortcut to the shelf, in our case Windows > Content Browser.
3. Hold SHIFT + CONTROL (or SHIFT + COMMAND on macOS) and left click.
4. The icon for that item should appear on the shelf you selected.

And that’s it, simple and useful.

Look, I get it. Having a big screen for drawing/painting is amazing! Last year I bought a Wacom Cintiq Pro 24″, and not only it has a big screen, but also huge bezels, which are super useful for resting your hand while drawing and not touching the screen, etc etc etc…

Problem is, you either get a bigger table, or you will be in a complicated situation regarding space.

Lately, I’ve been barely using my Cintiq for drawing, and the other day when I had to finish a ZBrush task I even used my old Wacom Intuos Pro, because for me it feels more comfortable to use, there’s no need to adjust height or anything like that, and no fan noise either.

Same thing with the iPad, it’s light, it’s ready to use whenever I want and no fan noise, because guess what, it doesn’t have a fan!

So, yeah, I guess that a big Cintiq is not for me after all.

I’m not sure if this is widely known, but Maya has a bunch of samples of objects and other type of content, that you can easily use to test things out.

You can access the Content Browser via Windows > Content Browser, or via panels like so: Panels > Panel > Content Browser.

From there, you can drag and drop any model into your scene.

Via: https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/maya/getting-started/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/2023/ENU/Maya-ManagingScenes/files/GUID-9221B2E8-7E68-4ECB-94DC-ABEB21E956BF-htm.html

This is not a review, nor a post where you’ll find all about the technical specs of the new iPad Pro. This is not a post where you’ll be told that “the new iPad Pro with the new M2 chip is the worst Apple product of 2022”, nope.

What is this, then?

This is a post about my experience with a new feature of the new iPad Pro M2: the Apple Pencil Hover.

Now, I don’t know whether it should be totally possible to implement this feature on the old iPads, I don’t doubt it, but I also don’t think it’s that simple. Yeah yeah, other devices has this feature for a long time already, but they are different devices, different brands, different implementations.

Of course, maybe Apple could’ve implemented this before, but they didn’t, and it is what it is.

Apple Pencil Hover

Ok, so a couple of days ago I bought the new iPad Pro 11” with the new M2 chip, just because of the hover feature. Before that, I was using a iPad Pro 11” 2018, and it was still performing extremely well, at least for my type of use — drawing and painting.

But there was one thing missing: a way to display a preview of the pencil tip before it touches the screen. Thankfully, that was solved with the new iPad using the M2 chip.

The hover feature works as you might expect, once the tip of the pencil is close to the screen you’ll be able to see the “cursor”, or in some apps like Procreate (5.3 and later) the shape of the brush.

Speaking of Procreate, they did an impressive job with their implementation. You not only have the brush shape preview, but also the brush color preview. And that’s not all, if you have the eraser selected, you’ll see a preview of how that part of the canvas will look like after you erase it. Just brilliant.

I’m excited to see what Adobe will do with Fresco.

Mirroring the screen + hover

Before the release of the Apple Pencil Hover, you could still mirror your iPad to a bigger screen. However, it was kinda useless, since you’d still need to be looking at your iPad screen, to see what you were actually drawing/painting.

With the new Apple Pencil Hover, that’s not longer an issue. Finally, you can use your iPad as a drawing tablet, but also have the option to have a fantastic screen available.

In conclusion

I’m seriously considering in selling my Wacom Cintiq Pro 24. Having such a versatile device like an iPad is priceless, not to mention its portability.

If you are painting some UV on Substance Painter and you notice that the brush strokes are bleeding/leaking to another parts of the UV, there’s a big chance that the brush Alignment mode is set to Tangent Wrap. Simply change it to UV to avoid any bleeding/leaking.

Example:

Via: https://substance3d.adobe.com/documentation/spdoc/paint-tool-bleeds-on-other-uv-islands-186975827.html

We live in a high-tech world, in some sense we have superpowers. With our drawing software programs, we can go back and undo mistakes at any time. We don’t need to think much before every brush stroke.

Is this healthy at all? The answer for that you won’t find here on this blog post. Sorry.

But one thing I can tell you; it seems like we are losing some cognitive stuff with all the options we have. Everything is super accessible and a click away of distance. But is this so bad? Again, answers you won’t find here.

Traditional drawing

Last year I took Peter Han’s Dynamic Sketching classes, and, although it’s not a strict requirement, you are kinda requested to use felt tip pen and paper only. Again, you can still use your digital drawing setup, but is not recommended.

It was during those moments, when I was struggling not to double tap my fingers on the paper to undo something, that I realized how we (or just me, but I doubt that) are — in some sense — “addicted” to the easiness that digital tools has to offer. The same applies when I’m reading something and I try to tap a word to highlight it on a book. And again, this might not be totally bad, but is at least curious.

You might need to adapt to the environment you are in, that’s for sure.

Hey, everyone! It’s been a long time, and it’s been almost a year since I bought a Wacom Cintiq Pro 24. Undoubtedly, the most expensive hardware I’ve ever bought in my entire life. So, this is my short review.

What’s in the box?

Well, for starts, the Cintiq itself, of course. Including in the box you’ll find a Wacom ExpressKey — a fancy remote control with hotkeys, if you are into this sort of thing —, a Wacom Pro Pen 2, plenty of cables, and that’s basically it. No, a glove is not included… cmon, Wacom!

The screen

What can I say of a 4K screen with 99% Adobe RGB (CIE 1931) (typ) color coverage? It’s more than enough to even use it as a second monitor, of course.

The model I bought is not the touch one, and if you check some videos on YouTube you’ll understand why I avoided the model with touch. The touch response is super slow, like, really really slow! The newer Cintiq Pro 16 (from 2021) does a better job on that front, but still, not as good as any iPad for instance.

Wacom Pro Pen 2

With 8192 pressure levels, the not-so-new Wacom Pro Pen 2 shines — not literally of course.

It’s the same pen that comes with the Wacom Intuos line, and of course, it works with the Intuos drawing tablet as well, so that’s a plus.

As most drawing tablet/display’s pens these days, it’s completely battery free. There’s not much to say here, it just works. As any good tool, it does your job very well.

Wacom ExpressKey

Instead of adding programmable keys on the display itself, the Cintiq Pro 24 comes with the Wacom ExpressKey. 

It’s almost the same size as an iPhone 12/13 mini, and it magnetically attaches to the bezel of the Cintiq with a decent grip. I can move the Cintiq around the it won’t fall off, which is great!

I tried a lot to get used to it, but honestly, I always go back to the good old keyboard. The only thing I’ve been using is the radial button to change the brushe’s size, that’s all.

Wacom Flex Arm

Although the Cintiq has some legs, the angles you can achieve just with those legs are just not enough, and for some reason ($$$) the Cintiq Pros don’t use the VESA interface, though, there’s a Wacom VESA mount “adaptor” that should allow you to install your Cintiq on any VESA arm, as long as it can hold its weight.

Other than that, you “need” to buy the Wacom Flex Arm if you want to have a more ergonomic experience, or you could buy the Wacom Ergo Stand. Both are super expensive, but the Ergo Stand is heavier. I bought the Flex Arm because of its weight, and of course, it’s a bit cheaper.

The Wacom Flex Arm allows you to position the Cintiq in basically any angle, and it’s not complicated to install.

Why you don’t need a Wacom Cintiq Pro 24?

First, you don’t need a drawing display to make good art, or to be a professional. Instead, you can go with a drawing tablet. Yes, the learning curve is probably higher with the latter, but, at the end of the day, they are just tools.

Any Cintiq is expensive, and this one it’s just cheaper than the 32” version. Put the Wacom Flex Arm price on top of it, and we are talking about a lot of money, about $2.4k. With that budget, you can get a Wacom Intuos Pro (or any other drawing tablet) + an iPad Pro and have a nice combo.

At the end of the day, it’s just another tool, as long as you know how to use it, it doesn’t matter that much.

It’s inevitable; sometimes, in life, you’ll buy something you don’t need.

But that doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing…

Pros

• 4k display
• Crispy colours, crispy screen
• Wacom Pro Pen
• No delays: screen + pen

Cons

• The fan noise gets a bit “loud” from time to time
• It’s super heavy for a drawing display. You need a proper table to install the Wacom Flex Arm with the Cintiq.
• Super expensive!