Malcolm Owen
Wacom has introduced the Bamboo Sketch, a smart stylus for iOS devices that offers pressure sensitivity, allowing users to draw and write on their iPhones and iPads as they would on paper, without requiring an upgrade to an Apple Pencil and the iPad Pro family of devices.
The Bamboo Sketch offers users 2,048 levels of pressure sensitivity, with the choice of soft and firm exchangeable pen nibs allowing users to change the way the stylus feels when pressed against the display. Weighing in at 18 grams (0.6 ounces), the Bamboo Sketch measures 142 millimeters (5.6 inches) long, and has a diameter of 10 millimeters (0.4 inches) at its widest point.
Wacom claims the stylus has a premium soft-touch surface coating the barrel, and an ergonomic triangular design to make it more comfortable to grip, a design concept the company has used before with other stylus releases.
The battery is said to last for up to 15 hours of usage, with a connector on the side allowing the Bamboo Sketch to attach to a supplied magnetic USB adapter for charging. Connectivity with the iOS device is conducted over Bluetooth, with a status indicator on the side notifying when the stylus is paired correctly.
On either side of the status indicator are two shortcut buttons, which users can customize within apps. The Bamboo Sketch is also already integrated with a number of creative apps, including Bamboo Paper, Autodesk SketchBook, ArtRage, and Astropad.
Shipping globally in June and supplied with a carry case, the Wacom Bamboo Sketch will cost $79.95. Specific device and iOS compatibility is unknown, at this time, but Wacom advises it will work with "older iPad generations" and iPhone 6 and above.
William Gallagher
Charles Martin
Christine McKee
8 Comments
This looks really good! Might invest in one for my 6 plus (soon to be 8)
I'd be interested to see a comparison of this on an iPad (2017) and the Apple Pencil on iPad Pro.
I hope it works well, so I can stop hearing people complain about needing Apple Pencil on their iPad mini.
I thought "real" styli had to have an eraser....
Cool! If it works well, I would have zero reason to invest in an iPad Pro. Apple not making Pencil universal across devices was shortsighted, IMHO. Can't wait to try it out.
I think the biggest issues of styluses is handling the gap between the glass and the pixels. Apple pencil is doing an amazing job on that, you can almost choose a pixel and touch it with Apple pencil. I have tried wacom bluetooth connected stylus with iPad Air 2 which has laminated screen but the experience wasn't even close to Apple pencil with iPad pro. The easiest stylus test for me to draw a line on the screen and try to re-catch the line and continue to draw the line. If I cannot catch the line on my second touch, that stylus is not for me. With Apple pencil every try I can do that successfully.