If you are in the market for a graphics tablet, you'll want to take a serious look at Wacom, which makes the highest quality tablets at the consumer price point. Once you've decided on purchasing Wacom, your biggest challenge will probably be knowing which model to choose. There are several factors that go into determining the best tablet for your needs, and we have done some of the homework for you to help make that decision a little easier. 

If you have never used a graphics tablet and are looking for a user-friendly model, you've come to the right place. These tablets are simple enough to be non-intimidating to new users, yet pack enough features to please the professionals.

Intuos

The Intuos line is the most basic, yet offers of a choice of three highly functional tablets. 

The Intuos Small Pen and Intuos Small Pen and Touch weigh in at just over 300 g and are a nice portable size at approximately 255 x 165 mm. Features on both models include a pressure sensitive pen with 3 replacement nibs , free software, drawing, sketching, painting, and document mark-up capabilities on an active area of 152 x 95 mm. A wireless accessory kit is available but sold separately. The Pen and Touch models come with an eraser feature on the pen, and allow multi-touch gestures to zoom, scroll, rotate and more at only a slight increase in cost.

The lack of eraser feature on the Pen model is a bit of drawback, which encourages most Cadshop.com.au customers to opt for the Pen and Touch models.

The tablets connect to your computer via USB and are compatible with Windows Vista, Windows 8, and Windows7 (32- or 64-bit), and with Mac OS X 10.6.8 or later.

• If you are a beginner or someone just starting out in creative digital content creation, and are looking for a portable tablet at a budget-friendly price point, either of these are a good choice for you. You can decide whether the eraser and touch features are worth paying a little bit more for.

TheIntuos Manga Pen and Touch Small is essentially the same as the Pen & Touch small, with the notable addition of free software that will please manga artists: Manga Studio Debut 4 and Anime Studio Debut 8.

• Obviously, if you are a manga artist or interested in becoming one, having the integrated software at your fingertips is pretty enticing.

The Intuos Pen and Touch Medium Tablet basically offers similar features as the small pen and touch version but with a significantly larger active drawing area of 216 x 135 mm. The medium model is still portable, weighing just a smidge over 500 g, and will fit comfortably in your laptop bag while accommodating a much broader range of motion during use. Again, the wireless kit is available but sold separately. 

• This is a standard size tablet and offers a lot of functionality for the price. If you are a beginner with a little more money to spend, you might choose this over the smaller models. This is also a great choice for designers or artists who are getting a little more serious about creating digital content, who prefer having a wider range of motion while drawing, or do a lot of work on laptops and need a workhorse that retains portability.

Intuos Pro

The Intuos Pro series kicks everything up a notch, and comes in three different sizes. Your choice here will depend largely on when and where you do your work. 

The Intuos Pro Pen and Touch Small  is 320 x 208 x 12 mm, and weighs about 660 g, making it a bit larger than the Intuos small model. The comparison ends there, because the pro version is a whole other beast. Features include the ability to quickly and professionally edit photos and create digital content with 2048 levels of pen pressure sensitivity in both the tip and eraser. It has a Touch Ring with 4 customizable functions and 6 customizable Expresskeys™, other standard features include

• Express View Display (hud)
• Dedicated Pan, Scroll, Zoom, Brush Size
• Radial Menu
• Precision Mode
• Display Toggle

The software package includes Adobe Photoshop Elements 11 and Anime Studio Debut 8 among others ( refer to cadshop.com.au for full details ) , and the wireless accessory kit is included. 

• The Active Area is quite compact at 157 x 98 mm but If you're pretty serious about digital creative content and want a portable option to work with your laptop or on occasional projects, this is an excellent option. Works for right or left-handed users.

The Intuos Pro Pen and Touch Medium brings the same features in a 380 x 251 x 12 mm package, with two additional Expresskeys™, it is still fairly portable, but at just under 1 kg  it adds some heft to your laptop bag. 

• Again with an Active Area of 224 x 140 mm  this is a great option for serious digital artist or designer who still value portability, but at this size it is an excellent tablet for regular desktop use. 

The Intuos Pro Pen and Touch Large  is a beautiful and truly large tablet, with features similar to the medium.

• With an Active Area of 325 x 203 mm, the size makes it the tablet of choice for the professional or serious amateur digital artists, or anyone working in large formats or with multiple monitors. This is a desktop tablet for serious digital content creators, accommodating a full range of motion.

Cintiq

The Cintiq models are top of the line pen-on-screen devices that allow the artist to draw directly on the display. All models offer a multi-position display and feature a pressure and tilt sensitive Pro Pen that performs like traditional pencils, pens and markers, HD display, and ergonomic design.

The various Wacom Cintiq models offer many of the same functions with increasing screen size, from the Cintiq 13HD with a 13 inch screen a carrying case through the 22 and 24 inch models that come with a choice of touchscreen capability or not. 

• These are the choice models for professionals. Which model you choose will depend on whether you need a portable option, how important touch capability is to you, and of course your budget. The ability to switch between pen and touch will prove useful for some users. 
• The 24 inch models are ideal for animation, photography and video editing where color is critical as it displays more than one billion colors and 97% of the Adobe color range.

For more info and pricing on our range of Wacom Graphics Tablets click here 

Written by the team at Digital3D