Pixar staff gets early chance to test iPad Pro & Apple Pencil

Apple recently brought the iPad Pro and the Apple Pencil to the award winning Hollywood filmmakers at Pixar, giving the studio's digital animation wizards an early sneak-peek at its upcoming technology.

"Lovely of our friends from Apple to stop by to let us take iPad Pro & Pencil for a test drive," commented Michael Johnson, the lead of a Pixar team that creates the tools for animating its movies. In response to a question on Twitter, Johnson claimed that the Pro had "perfect palm rejection as far as we were able to see."

Palm rejection is essential for people doing handwriting or illustration on tablet, since touchscreens otherwise can't distinguish a palm from the tip of a finger or stylus.

Apple is presumably hoping to sell Pixar on adopting the Pro, since some of Apple's main targets for the product are professionals in illustration and 3D modeling.

The two corporations already have close ties. Apple co-founder Steve Jobs was once the CEO of Pixar, and after Pixar was taken over by Disney, he became that company's largest individual shareholder and a member of the board of directors. Current Disney CEO Bob Iger sits on the Apple board, and Jobs' widow — Laurene Powell Jobs — now controls his Disney shares.

The iPad Pro is due to ship sometime in November, and features a 12.9-inch screen specifically designed to be more responsive to touch input. The Pencil is a separate accessory that will cost $99.

30 Comments

ireland 17435 comments · 18 Years

About 9 years ago

iPad Pro looks great. But as with any professional product it'll live or die by what software it offers. Apple should be courting Adobe to bring full PS to iPad Pro. That alone would be huge for this product.

paxman 4729 comments · 17 Years

[quote name="Ireland" url="/t/188573/pixar-staff-gets-early-chance-to-test-ipad-pro-apple-pencil#post_2783747"]iPad Pro looks great. But as with any professional product it'll live or die by what software it offers. Apple should be courting Adobe to bring full PS to iPad Pro. That alone would be huge for this product.[/quote] My guess is that most of the graphics software co's will be working very hard to get their apps out asap after launch. A full version of Photoshop might be overkill, though, don't you think? I imagine many more dedicated single purpose apps will be available on launch or soon thereafter.

cornchip 1943 comments · 11 Years

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ireland

iPad Pro looks great.

Hell yeah it does!

Originally Posted by Ireland

But as with any professional product it'll live or die by what software it offers. Apple should be courting Adobe to bring full PS to iPad Pro. That alone would be huge for this product.

Except it would have to be completely rethought & redesigned. It's not like Photoshop has some magical greatness that makes it great for sketching, in fact, in some ways it kinda blows. It's just that that's what everyone uses because it's the best-ish thing out there right now. But that's rapidly changing. And now that apps like ProCreate can export to psd, if you absolutely have to use Photoshop you can. And now that artists & designers don't have to be tethered to a Mac to get a great sketching experience, there's even less of a necessity for Photoshop. I'm sure Adobe will get around to it eventually, but it's hardly a necessity at this point.

recronin 11 comments · 12 Years

"Current Disney CEO Bob Iger sits on the Apple board, and Jobs' widow -- Laurene Powell Jobs -- now controls his Disney shares." That was very nice of Mr. Iger!

palegolas 1362 comments · 19 Years

Cool. This is really great. But they should have been part of the development in the early process. Feedback #1. Can you make a bigger version for in house production use?