As any digital media artist will inform you, having a quality pen tablet is crucial in the field of illustration—professional, freelance, or hobbyist. While it is possible to produce some decent-looking images with a mouse, the process is made infinitely easier and more organic with a tablet. The pens have highly sensitized tips that replicate the way natural tools respond to pressure. For example, if using a Brush tool in Adobe Photoshop, pressing roughly results in a thick and saturated stroke while a lighter touch yields fine, delicate marks.
Even though they are basically essential, tablets can be very expensive. Wacom has responded to the demand for affordable tablets with the Bamboo line. Today I’ll be looking at the Wacom Bamboo Fun Medium tablet package.
The Wacom Bamboo Fun is a neat little tablet that is available in four colors and two sizes (small, which has a work area of 6 x 3.5 in; and medium, which is 8.5 x 5.5 in). The “active” area has a surface that is meant to imitate paper texture. This was a big bonus for me since, like most artists, I am more comfortable with a traditional pen-and-paper approach to art.
Drawn with the Bamboo Fun. Illustration copyright Charlotte Tarlitz
In terms of the initial “What cool shit do I get?” factor, I was fairly impressed by just how many items come with the Bamboo package. Besides the actual tablet, you’ll get the stylus, three replacement tips for the pen (since frequent drawing does tend to wear them out), a matching display stand for the pen, a mouse, and a disk of bundled software. For myself personally, I did not find much use for the software. The two best software pack-ins were Photoshop Elements and Corel Painter Essentials, both of which are abbreviated versions of programs I already owned. Both were good sampler platters for the capabilities of each full program, though I believe it is fair to assume that most people dropping two hundred dollars on an art-specific tool would already own the necessary art-related software.
Performance wise, I sincerely can’t complain. It acts like a real drawing instrument and elegantly bridges the gap of awkwardness between digital and traditional art production. There are many customizable features that really lend to a more intuitive drawing experience. A few examples include the ability to vary whether the tip/eraser feels like a soft or hard lead, the ability to assign sensitivity settings to hotkeys, and two fully programmable buttons on the pen tool. My personal preference is to set them to zooms or specific brush sets so that I can change brush options without having to waste time clicking around the menu.
The features that have been sacrificed from the Intuos model are the availability of other pen attachments, such as an airbrush, inking, or art pen, the lack of a “large” and “extra large” size, and a different physical interface on the tablet itself. The Bamboo lacks the Intuos’ control wheel and ambidextrous button placement.
There is, however, one noteworthy detraction from the awesomeness of this tool—the trouble I had finding it. At the time I purchased it, it was listed in Apple’s store. I ordered it, the purchase was charged to my account, and then a few days later I was informed that Apple was out of stock and would no longer be carrying this item. Next I went directly to the source at Wacom’s site. Again I was met with disappointment when my purchase screen apologized to me “BAMBOO FUN PEN & TOUCH could not be purchased. Continue shopping?”. At this point I figured it might be easier just to see if I could find it physically in a store in my area. The answer was a resounding no. Best Buy, Office Max, Apple and Fry’s all tried their best to point me to The Wacom Intuos model, or perhaps the Cintiq, which they did have in stock. The Intuos starts at $350 and the Cintiq at around $1000. I have used a Bamboo model before and KNEW it not only performed well, but started at $150 less than an Intuos.
I started to become convinced that there was an elaborate conspiracy from Wacom to force people to purchase the more expensive models by simply killing the availability of good ol’ Bamboo. Just when I thought all hope was lost, an employee at the second Fry’s I went to checked the back for me and retrieved a dusty box with the last Bamboo Fun Medium they had. It was white, but I wasn’t about to complain about the color when I’d finally found my long-sought art buddy.
At the time of publication, it is still not available on Wacom’s own website. Still, it can be purchased online from Amazon
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Unless you know for a fact that you need the advanced features or size of the Intuos, the Bamboo Fun is an exceptionally full-featured tablet for a significantly better price than their traditionally high-end tablets. We’re proud to award the Wacom Bamboo Fun the Icrontic Stamp of Approval.
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