[Closed] Design/illustration apps for iPad

Adobe Illustrator has been the benchmark for years on desktops. I've not used the iPad version (illustrator Draw) but I suspect that's the best place to start if you're taking it seriously. It's very intuitive.

What kind of stuff does she do rob. Always like to see good illustrations

Hello I'm an illustrator too, well trained in fine art but working as an illustrator/graphic designer. Adobe illustrator on desktop is a must ( Corel draw is good, better than some give it credit for) the iPad version of illustrator is good but I find it more of a side tool to the desktop version. If she's an IT novice I recomend getting to grips with illustrator and indesign, all my clients thee days want PDF files rather than hand drawn things. If you want to pick my brain on the industry and agencies please feel free to do so.

Edit: the most recent illustrator on CC is the easiest version yet to learn.

I quite like Pixelmator, but I'm no pro.

Inkpad, Paper, and Penultimate.

I'd echo what KO says there. iPads are great for showing stuff, but I'd use a decent Mac for producing it. It's far less hassle. When I'm illustrating, I tend to flit about between illustrator and Photoshop, depending on what I'm doing, then put it all together in indesign, and save the final files down as PDF's. It's all pretty much drag and drop between the 3 in the latest CC Version, and very user friendly. You can work your way around how to do pretty much anything with trial and error

I use

inkpad (in all honesty requires infinite time and patience, compared to a desktop, not the fault of the app so much as the drawbacks of a big clumpy fingertip - mice like nodes much more than my fingers or stylii)
Ink
Procreate
Artrage
Ps touch
Snapseed (great for importing finished work and putting some texture and lighting to it)

for tonal sketches/relaxing - Zen brush

Thanks for the tips.

She has no knowledge of Illustrator and Photoshop. She was supposed to be taught them while at Uni (late 90's) in her surface pattern degree but never was. She finds learning PC stuff incredibly difficult and struggles big time - even online tutorials she struggles with. She needs a classroom course but they are few and far between unfortunately.

The iPad is to show the work she has done but I thought if she could get to grips with a selection of apps on that then it might help to transfer to PC if she eventually uses one.

She paints in acrylic, fine art stuff. She gets lots of "wows" everytime she shows her work to people (including design professionals) but is 15 years behind the industry as far as using the technology is concerned. She has already sold some work with the help of another freelancer but is finding it difficult to get started in the business.

I'd definitely go the Adobe route rob. It's industry standard, so it's the format people will expect stuff to be produced and delivered in.

The thing with it is that it is genuinely intuitive. And the only way to learn it is to get stuck in and have a play. Once you do, you start to get to grips with it pretty quickly. And you'll learn as much from happy accidents as tutorials.

Good luck with it!

It's a tough industry to get into from my experience. I got my big break when a buyer for Saatchi invidulated my degree show (2005) and bought my exhibition work. I went into part time shop work straight after my degree and started freelancing. About a year after graduating I got a call from the buyer and got my first big job doing some illustrations for the music industry. I propped up my dream by doing drawings/illustrations of pets/people anything while the bigger contracts came in. I was never taught any graphic software at uni so started to self learn. Somehow in the last 10 years I've ended up owning a record label, had a few books published and now run a design studio for a multi national. The only advice I have is grind away and no matter how daunting learn the technology. My heart of hearts is in traditional media but there's so little call for it. Illustrator files are 'vectors' meaning they can be reproduced in any size without losing quality or being distorted. This is what clients want. I imagine your wife has a keen eye so I think she should be able to translate her skills. When I'm hiring I can tell those traditionally trained and those portfolios which are graphics based.

What I mean by talking about myself is a bit of luck, Skill & grafting.

There is work out there as a traditional illustrator but it's not common place. I would find a style that sells/works and stick to it. If you wish to share some of her work on here or via email I am happy to look at it and maybe suggest courses/agencies/direction. When I was freelance agencies were everything and they all look for a strong online portfolio. Surface pattern jobs now are mainly vector based to, it's really not that daunting once you have the basics.

The thing with it is that it is genuinely intuitive. And the only way to learn it is to get stuck in and have a play. Once you do, you start to get to grips with it pretty quickly. And you'll learn as much from happy accidents as tutorials.

This +1

The most recent pen tool in illustrator is a joy to use.

Theres a few good apps for displaying portfolios. My two favourites are:
Minimal folio which is as simple a delivery platform as your likely to get but which also ties into dropbox so is easy to update or tailor to specific meetings.

The other isn't an app as such but is adobe's online portfolio tool, Behance. It allows you to upload your work and displays it as a html portfolio. In its most basic form its very easy to use but you can customise it heavily to suit your needs if you want to invest a bit of time into it. The nice thing about this route is you've got a html link to send to prospective clients before you meet them.

inkpad (in all honesty requires infinite time and patience, compared to a desktop, not the fault of the app so much as the drawbacks of a big clumpy fingertip - mice like nodes much more than my fingers or stylii)
Ink

It is also a problem that we can't really afford to buy Photoshop and Illustrator either. I have an old copy of Photoshop that was downloaded for free from Adobe but my computer struggles to run it - old laptop.

I have looked at that CC thing (I have no idea about cloud stuff to be honest so don't know if that is useful or helpful) and it's still £47 a month to get both applications which we can't really afford.

My wife has no interest in doing the actual artwork on the computer, she would rather go and do another job than that - is there no use for painting/drawing stuff traditionally and then scanning/manipulating afterwards? That's what I was hoping she could do.

When you have been away from a field for so long it seems impossible to find out anything about what you should be doing. It's very disheartening.

My wife has no interest in doing the actual artwork on the computer, she would rather go and do another job than that - is there no use for painting/drawing stuff traditionally and then scanning/manipulating afterwards? That's what I was hoping she could do.

Yes of course, but less call for it than there used to be. Look at children's books for example. A friend was in a similar position and started a mural painting business. What is your wife's work like?

I may well have a copy of photoshop and illustrator cs3 with a licence I can look on Monday. But again your laptop may struggle.

Just to put a spanner, somewhat, in the works, the other issue with CC is if you aren't subscribed, you can no-longer open your own work!

Perhaps look at buying an older machine with a legit copy of Illustrator and Photoshop already installed? If you get the DVDs as well, you should be fairly safe.

Or, you might be able to springboard yourself using CS2, which is available [url= http://www.techspot.com/downloads/5724-adobe-illustrator-cs2-free.html ]legitimately[/url] for free [url= http://www.forbes.com/sites/adriankingsleyhughes/2013/01/07/download-adobe-cs2-applications-for-free/ ][near enough][/url]. If you can create some new work using that and export as PDF or another format the commissioning person requests which is compatible with the CS2 [old!] version you're using you might be able to get enough money together to start renting CC etc. Be careful though, you don't want to get stuck with work done that no-one can open. However, if the work is fairly simple, CS2 should hack it, and if you check the client is happy opening those files it might be the answer? Sending the work as PDF should avoid a compatibility/rendering issue.

I have heard that the full, pre-cloud apps can be found on the internet for downloading, too, but by golly, I'd be careful doing that as:

1: You're breaking the law and it's very easy to trace/prove [ISP logs n' all]
2: Most torrents/downloads are virus hell. [No you can't be sure your antivirus will protect you!]

There are various free/opensource/trial programs you might be able to use - Inkscape for example.

Last option - do you live anywhere near Bradford and have a PC in the house? I might be able to help further.

Just to put a spanner, somewhat, in the works, the other issue with CC is if you aren't subscribed, you can no-longer open your own work!

YOWSERS - that's not good is it?

We live in Huddersfield BTW.

The PS I have on the laptop was downloaded for free from Adobe, it was a link posted up on here a while back.

I was considering buying a new PC if it helps. As we are going towards having all Apple devices (and this would help my wife as they work together so well and I don't have the crashes and problems with PC stuff I was thinking about getting a Mac Mini. One should go on her design desk unobtrusively with a wall mounted monitor and wireless keyboard but I am concerned they aren't very powerful. Better than our 4yo laptop though....

Sorry, I didn't notice your username was the guy who said you already had d/l'd a copy.

You can email me at sam{d0t}firth{?t}gmail{d0t}com, if you drop in to my place, you may be glad you did 😉

Rob - if it was my money I'd go for a 27" iMac. The bigger screen is worth its weight in gold when producing any kind of artwork. I use that and a 17" MacBook Pro.

I know your better half doesn't want to produce work on a Mac, but you can't view it as 'technology'. It isn't. It's just a tool. The same as a pencil, or a palette of acrylics. It's no different. You're producing artwork just the same, just using a different tool. I will illustrate by hand as ink outlines, scan it in then colour it up on the Mac In Photoshop and illustrator. This ensures it'll print well commercially, amongst other considerations.

I really don't want to sound brutal, but if you go into this industry with that attitude, then you're on a hiding to nothing right from the off. It's ultra-competitive, and there's a lot of talent out there. And I'd say all are using macs to produce work in the formats industry demands. I have been doing for 20 years.

Rob - My address is in my profile. Drop me a mail. I'm not far from you, and would be happy to help out. It really isn't that daunting once you get started, but I can't stress enough how much harder things will be if you're resistant to using industry standard technology. Sorry if This all sounds harsh, and it's not what you want to hear, but it's just the way things are.

It's not an attitude that she won't use the tech, it's just learning how to is very difficult, especially when you are not computer savvy at all. I personally can't get to grips with PS and I have been quite techy in my past.

The cost of the equipment and software is a huge stumbling block - buying a 27" iMac and/or a MacBook Pro is simply not affordable for us - took me a while to save up for the tablet from my wages/selling bike stuff.

Don't get me started on the cost of it all! It's what happens when you have an industry where one player has a total monopoly on hardware, and another has a complete monopoly on software. And both price according to that. It's an ongoing scandal that it's been allowed to get to this point really. Adobe forcing everyone onto their subscription model being the latest example. But what choice do we have? None! It's take or leave it ( and then lose your job/business)

Rob - drop me a mail fella.

Email sent to binners/gofasterstripes - thanks.

What you could do, is work on improving F/OSS equivalents - through coding. testing or just making a small financial contribution to the orgaisations that make the software.

But yeah, it's a PITA.

I produced quite an impassioned presentation in uni about this subject 😀

Ransoming gits, the lot of them.

Adobe and Autodesk are probably the worst.

The cost of the equipment and software is a huge stumbling block - buying a 27" iMac and/or a MacBook Pro is simply not affordable for us

Adobe software works just as well on a PC as a mac, if money is tight then you may be able to cobble a fairly high spec PC together for quite a bit less cash than the equivalent mac. If you keep it purely for work, only install work related software on it and maybe even continue to use the laptop for browsing/email then you shouldn't have too much trouble with it.

Alternatively apple do a lease purchase scheme on macs. It could be that you tuck away the first 6 months of the 24 month lease period to give your wife a bit of a buffer in order to learn some stuff and make some inroads into paid work.

In it's higher specs the mac mini would be (just about) ok as a basic work machine but by the time you get to that end of the range the difference in cost between the mac mini, keyboard and mouse (assuming you already have a screen) isn't so far from the cost of the iMac. Certainly don't look at the bottom end mac mini and think that it will do, that version appears to be targeted as not much more than a media centre.

One of the major problems is that it's very difficult to learn anything unless it has a purpose, as soon as your wife has live projects to work on she'll have little choice but to work out how to achieve the result she wants. Without the focus that comes with a client and a deadline its hard to even know exactly what skills you need let alone be motivated to actually learn them. I've been using photoshop since version 2 and probably use less than 40% of the tools. It's such a broad piece of software that I only need to use a small part of it to do everything that i need for my work. Illustrator i use a lot more but even that I maybe use 60% of the functions. Your wife really doesn't need complete mastery of photoshop, once you start to use the software commercially you soon learn the bits that are important to your work and the bits that you'll probably never touch.

Cheapest iMac with 27" display is £1500.... 🙁

Don't get me started on the cost of it all!

Is it really that expensive?

Full Adobe sub £38 / month
New Mac every 3 years or so - £1500 ish

If you can't clear that amount of money you really need to get a new trade. It's professional software and not aimed at home/casual users.

When you have been away from a field for so long it seems impossible to find out anything about what you should be doing. It's very disheartening.

Learn the software needed for the job. Before shelling out on a new mac /PC anyone close who can give you a bit of tuition?

Don't get me started on the cost of it all!
Is it really that expensive?
Full Adobe sub £38 / month
New Mac every 3 years or so - £1500 ish
If you can't clear that amount of money you really need to get a new trade. It's professional software and not aimed at home/casual users.

My Dad, retired builder, was talking about my macbook I added the cost of the software on it and it was somewere near £7k. He didn't get how it cost so much. I compared it to his van loaded with tools etc, you can't do the job without them.

Adobe is £38 per month FOR NOW! Once everyone is on the subscription, see how long it stays at that price.

They did this when they initially bundled illustrator and Photoshop as Creative Suite. It looked like a no brainer. And Quark was finished! Then when everyone switched, they ratcheted the prices. They'll do the same again now. Absolutely Guaranteed!!

And for a Mac capable of doing high end design work, with software, you're looking at a minimum of 4k

If you can't clear that amount of money you really need to get a new trade. It's professional software and not aimed at home/casual users.

But if you can't afford the kit then you can't make the money in the first place to buy it......

It's a lot of money to outlay when you don't know if you'll be able to make a go of the business and you work part-time in a shop.

And for a Mac capable of doing high end design work, with software, you're looking at a minimum of 4k

Gulp. 🙁

Learn the software needed for the job. Before shelling out on a new mac /PC anyone close who can give you a bit of tuition?

I have looked into this. We don't know anyone who has the time to tutor her - I know 2 people who are amazing with the software she needs to use but don't have the time to tutor someone else.

So I looked into courses. There seems to be 2 different kinds - first ones are corporate ones which cost many hundreds, if not thousands, of pounds for a couple of days or maybe up to a week. The other sort are local Uni/Tech courses but there isn't any round us, the closest IIRC was Bradford but that started in September I think and next one I assume will be Sept 2015. They looked quite useful and weren't expensive too.

There are free courses if you are unemployed, which may be a good start, but she isn't unemployed.

If anyone knows of any other ideas in the West Yorks area I will look into them!

If you can't get anything else then get the CS2 version of photoshop and illustrator linked to above, that's free. Legacy files are not a problem everyone in the industry will be able to open your files, might be a bit tricky if people are sending you stuff but if you ask nicely most people can sort you out with something compatible.

The software from that version to the current version really isn't massively different, some shortcuts, a few easier to use/better implemented tools and better integration between packages but basically it's the same and perfectly good enough to learn with. if you learnt on CS2 and jumped straight to CC you'd only take about a day before it all felt like second nature.

Then you just need something to run it on. The beauty of older software is that it's designed to be functional on older computers so a lower spec machine will be passable.

This won't be a system that's a pleasure to work on but I reckon you could be up and running for £500-600. Then once your wife gets some paid work you can upgrade.

In the meantime your wife need to carry on producing her work by hand, get it scanned/photographed, put together a portfolio (which I think was the original question) and get it online and start talking to people that commission illustrations. Theres nothing to say that she won't walk in the right door at the right time and be offered a commission that allows her to go out and buy what she needs.

New Mac every 3 years or so - £1500 ish

My mother is an archaeological illustrator working exclusively with Apple [since the LC II].

She's just about to replace her machine. It's 7 years old. This is fairly normal for her. If you don't overload it, and make sure there's loads of RAM you'll go a long long way with even a fairly basic one.

NB - I haven't bought a Mac in a while, there may be a stinker in the range of which I haven't heard.

robdob - Another tip: If your Mrs can do some work for a University or other large organization, they may well pay for her to buy a machine and put some software on it. That's what my mother does, anyway.

O/T:

Regarding my mother,

Any tips for my Mum RE which machine to buy guys, bearing in mind her use of Photoshop/Illustrator/Cinema4D [occasionally]?

She's after a 27" iMac with basic-ish spec. Should she buy a Retina model? Where is the sweet-spot for the CPU? Where can she buy one with extra RAM fitted for less than Apple charges?

Is it possible to buy a secondhand one with a legit NON_SUBSCRIPTION version of CS6? on it? Any sources you are aware of?

Cheers!

And for a Mac capable of doing high end design work, with software, you're looking at a minimum of 4k

Gulp.

[i]Really?![/i] Our experience says otherwise. Maybe you're talking about a top-end machine, probably waaaay overkill for a bit of Illustrator and Photoshop.

Are you buying RAM from Apple or something 😉

Another option could be a Hackintosh build. My PC would run OSX and it's 12GB RAM 6Core Xeon and SSD would make light work of anything realistic. Cost, about £900 if you built a similar one now.

Hell, think of the movie "Monsters" - he made that on a Macbook.

RAM - you need a lot of RAM. Other than that, machines haven't got much faster in the last 4 years. Less power, yes. Faster - not much.

But if you can't afford the kit then you can't make the money in the first place to buy it......

Same with any business.

If you want cheap - try this (it gets very good reveiws)...
https://affinity.serif.com/
...you still need a recent Mac to run it on though.

Or get Corel Draw on the PC.

And for a Mac capable of doing high end design work, with software, you're looking at a minimum of 4k

No you don't - most designers I know use iMacs or even MacBook Pros. For high-end colour critical work using 100s of Photoshop layers then may-be you need 4k's worth of kit, but not for run-of the mill design work.

Rob, I just emailed you something else of use...

Good news!

I've just checked Kirklees College website and a new Photoshop course is starting next week for £95 for 10 weeks. We kept missing it - hopefully enough people enrol so they actually run it......

Thanks for all the help so far, I've learnt more on this thread than in the last 6 months banging my head against a brick wall....

No you don't - most designers I know use iMacs or even MacBook Pros. For high-end colour critical work using 100s of Photoshop layers then may-be you need 4k's worth of kit, but not for run-of the mill design work.

depends how big the files are, i use a maxed out 15in retina MBP and i’m starting to get into kettle boiling/tea making waits for saves on 8-10gb files. i work in 16 bit with multiple image layers and now camera sensors are 36-80 megapixels the files are massive, plus i render even bigger backgrounds for what i have shot so images are ending up around 10’000x7000 pixels. if the OP’s wife is creating multi layered images/artwork in photoshop/illustrator for repro at large sizes a low end computer will struggle.

the peachpit press visual guides are good for photoshop, give you a good grounding in the basics for people who dont geek-out on I.T. projects and hacking pc’s i’m sure they do an illustrator book.

do you have a wacom tablet? personally i would have invested in one of those rather than an iPad for drawing, the pen is so much better to use especially with brushing strokes and the varying pressure sensitivity.

is there a website of her work? that’s the most useful way of getting out there, i have custom hand made suede and leather A3 bound portfolios that were several hundred pounds each and an iPad but hardly ever get to see people with them as its mostly word of mouth or seeing my work out there that brings in more work.

Good news!
I've just checked Kirklees College website and a new Photoshop course is starting next week for £95 for 10 weeks. We kept missing it - hopefully enough people enrol so they actually run it......

Fantastic. Illustrator is going to be more useful in the long run but PS menu's, docks etc are similar. If you get your head around one the other will be much easier to pick up.

MrSmith has good advice on a Wacom tablet, they are ideal coming from traditional media. The better models are pressure sensitive etc but I have an old bamboo (which isn't) you welcome to borrow as a start. It can then be replaced as funds allow.

If you have an iPad try out Autodesk sketchbook pro and get a decent stylus to go with it. I use a basic wacom Bamboo, (you can now get bluetooth ones that mimic pressure sensitivity but they are still not as good as using a proper tablet and stylus) and it's very good for sketching and quick graphics. IMHO Sketchbook Pro is far more intuitive than a lot of other programmes out there as it's for sketching/painting rather than purely photo manipulation or vector graphics which is a bit of a black art.

However, for the real deal you will need to go to a Wacom Tablet that is at least A4 sized ( preferably bigger), a half decent PC or Mac, a good graphics card, fast HD or SSD and a stack of RAM, the biggest hi res screen you can afford and sketchbook pro/any other decent sketching software plus photoshop and illustrator.

All expensive but a good investment if you are aiming to do any work professionally or at least half seriously.

Just a warning, a lot of the online tutorials for Photoshop and illustrator range from mediocre to useless due to the complexity of the software, face to face tutorials are much better providing you can get a good teacher. Oddly enough though some of the "for Dummies" books and "illustrator/photoshop in east steps " are actually very good indeed if you are starting with the software.

And for a Mac capable of doing high end design work, with software, you're looking at a minimum of 4k

[img] [/img]
Aaaah, the G4 Digital Audio or Gigabit Ethernet, I suspect. My favorite Apple tower design ever.

You are doing it down a little, though, I think you'll find it had 2x450MHz 7400 series G4's or perhaps a single 466MHz 7410. MHz, not KHz 🙂

After updating flash player I got an adobe advert that I thought might be useful to the OP:

Bundle up
Photoshop and Lightroom together
£8.57/month

I know we'd come to the conclusion that buying the whole creative cloud suite of products was both overkill and prohibitively expensive but access to photoshop for under a tenner a month to get going doesn't seem too bad.

Huddersfield media centre (by the market) used to have some kind of open access Mac design suite.

🙂 the idea that you need a Mac is ridiculous (never mind a £4k one)- I worked as an art director/flash designer/multimedia developer for several years on a £600 dell laptop plugged into a cheap 21" monitor (until melted, but that was due to relocating to sunnier climes).

And as for software, if you're learning then there are cheap/free ways to get hold of it

Yeah, but if you're designing for screen only, then file sizes are small. Flash files are tiny! I produce hi resolution multi-layered photoshop renders for print. File sizes are effing huge!!! You wouldn't be doing that on a PC laptop.

The OP is going to need to do high resolution illustrations for print. So a cheap PC. Laptop won't cut it

My kids still use my old one of these, for web browsing....

[img] [/img]

😀

The OP is going to need to do high resolution illustrations for print. So a cheap PC. Laptop won't cut it

If they were purely vector based illustrations maybe a laptop would be ok. But were talking scanning, manipulating, editing, illustrating, lots of layers. Big files needing to be print ready. Very different to a flash file. An example I have just done is 4 gig, it's huge both in physical size and file size, this isn't an abnormal file size for some projects. I expect the OPs files to be much smaller than that in the first instance but they can easily get bigger as they want more from the software.

A cheap 21" monitor? Was this on old tube style monitor? Things are very different now.

It you're looking at illustration software for the Mac check out [url= https://affinity.serif.com ]Affinity Designer[/url]

I've recently moved over to Designer after using Illustator nearly 20 years. So far I'm very impressed. It does nearly everything I need ( missing a few typography features, but they're supposed to be on the way). I believe Designer is a credible alternative to Adobe Illustrator at a sensible price.

On the iPad i use Pixelmator.

I produce hi resolution multi-layered photoshop renders for print. File sizes are effing huge!!! You wouldn't be doing that on a PC laptop.

this^ i just supplied a well known high st retailer with some still life images for an email campaign that were 11300x7500 pixel dimensions and 257meg flattened tiff (layered files were 8-10gb) it may only be seen on a phone/laptop screen but a lot of clients need the option to print big if their needs change, it’s easy to make things smaller but uprezzing non vector images can only be taken so far.

Sorry - Can't help it:

"
How do you titillate an Ocelot?
Oscillate it's tits-a lot!
"

IGMC

As you were asking about the ipad, 53 is pretty cool. A couple of in app purchases and I bought " the pencil" for 20 ish on Amazon.

It you're looking at illustration software for the Mac check out Affinity Designer
I've recently moved over to Designer after using Illustator nearly 20 years. So far I'm very impressed. It does nearly everything I need ( missing a few typography features, but they're supposed to be on the way). I believe Designer is a credible alternative to Adobe Illustrator at a sensible price.
On the iPad i use Pixelmator.

I am going to give this a try out if curiosity. What made you switch from illustrator?

What made you switch from illustrator?

I couldn't justify the expense of Adobe's Creative Cloud.

I tried the demo and I think it's ok for someone wanting to get into design but not have the means for CC. I would still advise to use a free copy of CS2 though .

Update: The course my wife booked onto has been cancelled due to lack of take up. Arrrrgghh!!! Got to wait to at least April for another one. Also the woman who is in the business who helped her sell some work last year has moved away from Hudds so will be unable to help her any more.

1 step forwards and 2 steps back. 🙁

Why is it so damn difficult to penetrate this business????

It's such a shame. Her work has other professionals really impressed but as my wife can't use (and hasn't got) the tech needed it seems like her skills are wasted. We can't afford for her to go back to Uni but that seems like the only option.

You are doing it down a little, though, I think you'll find it had 2x450MHz 7400 series G4's or perhaps a single 466MHz 7410. MHz, not KHz