Review of Astropad w/ oPad Pro and Apple Pencil

Sorry for the wait! I have been having major troubles with both final cut pro, and laziness. Oh dear… Anyhow, it has been nice to have a little break, but I will be posting regularly again starting this week.

Because of the troubles with final cut, the video is terrible quality. Ugh. If you have trouble reading the words, here they are:

I am using Corel Painter to demonstrate how tilt can be used when sketching.

Something to say right away is how pixelated the iPad screen gets when you zoom/open menus. That said, you get used to it and just glance up at your desktop screen when you need to.

It is obvious when you use astropad that the design couldn’t possibly be better. It’s super easy to program the shortcut menu to display any shortcut button you want.

However, I could see it being useful to have additional shortcut buttons on your stylus. (A feature that is missing from the apple pencil.)

Not being able to hover over things or right click is definitely missed.

When I finished the sketch and went on to painting, I began to realize the potential of this app. I mean there are a lot of great apps for the iPad, but there’s no Corel Painter. Even though apps like Procreate are very capable along with being way more enjoyable to use, nothing beats desktop brush engines and options (yet.)

I can’t help but imagine where Astropad will go next. With they add bluetooth keyboard support? A hover option? Astropad’s forums are almost as active as Procreate’s which means your idea for a feature will be seen and considered.

Personally I can live without desktop programs (for now) because what I paint can usually be done in Procreate. But if you absolutely need to use desktop programs, and you are on a budget (relatively speaking,) you should definatley consider this as an option.