Top Recommended Graphics Tablet

Which is the top recommended graphics tablet?

Which drawing tablet is the best?

These are all valid questions which need to be addressed, but always keeping in mind that this is a higly individual matter that needs to be answered with caution.

With that in mind, I give you my personal recommendations and my take on this matter.

As I have previously mentioned in my post top graphics tablets, you need to be careful when choosing a drawing tablet, especially if you never had one before. You want to go for something that is not too expensive, but your choice has to be solid - you need to select a graphics tab that will have balanced specs, an adequate work surface, a pens stylus that will feel good in your hand and with good pressure sensitivity.

Now, what is ideal for somebody may be a disaster for someone else, so this is all more or less individual. However, I was asked to pick one tablet that could be considered the best choice for beginners and professional artists as well. Keeping in mind that not everyone has the same budget for a drawing tablet, I have selected two of these to review in this post, one cheaper and balanced, and one great, albeit a bit more expensive tablet.

Wacom Bamboo Create

When I just started out with digital art, I had a generic brand graphics tablet just to try out if it works for me to draw digitally. It turned out I loved it, but the tablet I had had horrible pressure sensitivity. Bamboo Fun tablet was the first version of this tablet, and when Bamboo Create was released, I had just enough money to get one. You will love this tablet - it has 1024 levels of pressure sensitivity (which is more than enough for most artists), it is 13.8 x 8.2 x 0.4 inches in size, it has express buttons, and virtually no compatibility issues. It dons a sleek design, it's easy to use, the pen stylus is perfect and the price is very accessible  If you'd ask me which is the best cheap to medium price graphics tablet to get, I'd say Wacom Bamboo Create.

Wacom Intuos5 Medium

This tablet offers 2048 levels of pressure sensitivity on a 48.4 square inches of working surface, which is somewhat impressive for its price. It's a perfect tablet for professional artists who cannot quite afford the Cintiq. On the other hand, this tablet offers you just about everything you need, so there is no point in looking further than this if you need very good specs. With Wacom Intuos5 Medium, you will get all of this for a reasonable price, and this tablet will be your best friend for a long time because of its quality and durability. This is my personal favorite graphics tablet, and I have no intention of getting another one for a good while. A warm recommendation.

Of course, if these two are not in your price range, or you'd like to see more graphics tablets and read some more reviews for the sake of comparison, you can go to my top 10 graphics tablets page and see some more. Feel free to leave a question or a recommendation of your own either there, or right here on this post.

Graphics Tablets for Beginners | Best Choices When Buying a First Graphics Tablet

So, what are the best graphics tablets for beginning artists?

This post will deal a bit more with differences between traditional drawing and digital drawing and editing. So, let's first explain those, even though I'm sure most of us know this already.

Traditional art and drawing implies that an artists uses a piece of paper and a pencil (or other materials of choice), to be blunt, and creates their masterpiece like that. So this is actually the old-fashioned way, which is elementary and mustn't be neglected or overlooked no matter how much we love our gadgets.

Digital art or digital drawing and editing implies, to be simple, using computers to create our art, whether we choose to use a mouse or a really neat graphics tablet with a lot of cool possibilities. That is the digital input method, which is used more and more to edit, fix, create or manipulate our art, all with ease and a lot of really great effects.

Now, if you have decided you need (or want) a good drawing tablet, then you must wonder about the differences between these two methods. Well, there are several things to keep in mind, and I will list them below.

1. Friction

You will find that drawing with a tablet is much smoother as the surface is like that to allow the stylus to simply 'glide' across it. It takes some getting used to.

2. Stylus is nothing like a pencil

While you wont have to worry about sharpening it or spending it, the stylus will not give you resistance like your good ol' fashioned pencil. And I mean very little resistance.

3. Pressure sensitivity

Each graphics tablet has certain pressure sensitivity levels which enables us to apply more or less pressure in order to get different strokes and so on. If we are used to drawing on paper, we may tend to use the same amount of pressure more or less in all our strokes, and repeat them where necessary. This aspect of the graphics tablets is maybe the best advantage, but also takes the longest time to get used to and learn to take maximum advantage of it.

Remember, finding a perfect tab is crucial if you are trying it out for the first time! Besides, you don't want to waste your money anyway, right?

However, in case you know this already, or want to know more about what exactly to consider when picking our YOUR future drawing tablet, then you need more information about graphics tablet options, possibilities and prices.

Go to this listing of top 10 graphics tablets to see exactly what I'm talking about, and find out more about best brands of tabs and see their reviews.