Due to the nature of the Apple iPad’s impressive touch-screen display, up until now, it has been impossible to do any real freehand drawing on the device, as its display isn’t pressure-sensitive. However, thanks to the guys at Ten One Design and their incredible iPad software development, by using their Pogo Touchscreen Stylus they have enabled such a feature and intend to share it with developers around the world.
So OK it is never going to be in the same bracket as the likes of the Wacom Graphics Tablet range, but never the less this is a fun, if not necessary inclusion in the development of apps allowing users a lot more freedom in the way they interact with the iPad with a pressure-sensitive drawing tool.
In addition to that, it may mean that the iPad could become seriously capable of handwriting recognition with the further development of the new technology – the very thing that Bill Gates wanted so much from those early Microsoft efforts at tablet devices.
Even if you are not impressed with this particular development, or even with the iPad as a whole initially, I think that this indicates the potential of the device when handed over to a third party. As long as Apple sanctions such developments (which they have been notoriously tight-fisted about in the past), the potential for the iPad is increasing by the day.
Of course, this technology would be compatible with all iOS devices, as, after all, it is only an ‘app’. So perhaps the iPhone is also in for some new boundaries when it comes to app development. So, depending on Apple’s leniency with third-party developers using this framework on their apps, it certainly has the potential to increase the usability of the device greatly with artists not being the only ones benefitting from the pen-based input.
Pen-based input… just writing those three simple words brings back the mourning of the now killed Microsoft Courier, which we were all intrigued by, if not excited about.
Take a look at the video below and see for yourself, although the time delay/lag involved in the drawing was only a software issue at the time of filming, it should be essentially real-time hopefully.
Is this kind of iPad stylus option something that you’d like to be able to use on your Apple tablet device? Surely anything that opens up more functions for it will be welcome?
Via – Ten One Design
