CompuServe Messages

PMJI. We have a Kurta XGT, and it is a fine tablet indeed. It has so many emulations and is so configurable it's incredible! Unfortunately, at the present time, the pressure stylus only returns pressure info (albeit a full 256 levels of pressure, vs. 64 for the older Wacoms and 128 for the Calcomp Drawing Pad II — the Calcomp stylus actually detects 256, but it clears the Least Significant Bit before returning the information to the computer, so you only get 128 out of it). The stylus mechanism appears to be identical to the Calcomp in physical capabilities (256 levels of tip pressure, plus tilt and bearing), but neither the Kurta nor the Calcomp return the full data to the computer. The Kurta returns a full 256 levels of tip pressure, but no tilt and no bearing data. The Calcomp returns only 128 levels of tip pressure, but also returns both tilt and bearing — and is, to the best of my knowledge, the ONLY currently available tablet and stylus that does! Fractal Designs Painter can fully utilize whatever information is being returned by the stylus (it supports the WINTAB specification, which is to advanced tablets what TWAIN is to scanners and other bitmap sources — it also has direct drivers of its own for the Calcomp Drawing Pad II and the Wacom — Kurtas must use WINTAB, but that works very well). A stylus that returns tilt and bearing as well as pressure is as far advanced over a pressure-only stylus, as a pressure stylus is over a plain down-up-only stylus, when using Fractal Painter or other software that can fully utilize that information! My recommendation: Forget Wacom. Forget Kurta until they come out with the ROM upgrade to pass tilt and bearing back to the computer. Go with the Calcomp Drawing Pad III, which is less expensive than either and yet is far better for use with Painter and similar programs! On Animator Pro: it works fine with the Wacom emulation mode (P3 if you have the factory default Personalities loaded), IF you tell AniPro to use the WACOM.IDR input driver ([E]xtra/[C]onfigure/[3]Select Input Device/[4] to change COM port if not COM1/[3]Custom Input Device/select WACOM.IDR), which is included with Animator Pro 1.3. The only tool that responds to the pressure data is the Spray tool, which uses it to control flow rate.