I like to draw with my Surface tablet; a traditional WACOM tablet or screen just doesn’t work with my workflow for drawing. I need to be able to hold it in my hand and spin it around and see what my pen is doing.
However, GIMP doesn’t work well with my tablet at all for one simple reason: it treats my fingers as an input the same as the pen.
When I start to draw something, GIMP could see my palm on the screen the same as if I clicked with the mouse, and it will draw lines or perform other tool actions in the spot where my hand is resting. For this one reason, drawing in GIMP is completely out of the question.
Additionally, there is no good way to pan/zoom with the pen, nor do I have an easy way to undo/redo. All these functions are mapped to keyboard and mouse functions, and are harder to hit with the super-high DPI on my tablet’s screen.
What I’ve had to do instead is use a different program entirely to draw with, (Clip studio paint,) which does give me a better drawing experience. I can easily pan/zoom with my fingers while the pen does the actual drawing. I have easy buttons for undo/redo, and all the other functions like layers are in a comfortable size and place. Plus the floodfill tool is exceptionally smart.
BUT - oh my word is there ever a but - that program does NOT have the features GIMP has for working as a graphics tool. I can’t move a selection to a pixel-precise level, I can’t set a color to an exact numerical value, I don’t have the brushes and brush tools I am used to, I don’t have the layer options I’m used to… The list goes on.
So I wind up having to draw half of my image on my tablet, export it and copy it to my PC, and then do the rest of the work in GIMP on my desktop. It’s a pain and a half.
I would be so much happier if GIMP could just recognize the difference between my finger-touch input and my surface pen. If I could use finger-touch for panning and zooming but nothing else, and use the pen input for all the tools and the menus, that would solve my problems right there. I’m fairly sure I can create a custom toolbar with buttons for undo/re-do and whatever other quick commands I want, so its really just about working with Microsoft’s pen and ink API (I think, don’t quote me about specific APIs.)
If this could be incorporated, it would revolutionize my process.
