Ipad Pro vs Cintiq Companion, whats right for you?
Well I’m getting to the point where I’m having to justify the existence of my Wacom
Companion. Its great to have the likes of Adobe Photoshop and illustrator on your lap but the fact remains the Cintiq is still quite a bulky beastie (gets pretty dam hot when used for those midnight scamping sessions too).
I will often find myself retreating back upstairs to work on my larger Cintiq and while I think that solitude can be a great way to focus on your master piece sometimes its nice to be sat on the couch, wife one side, dog on the other and Ice cold beer in the middle.
When illustrating for The Lonely Lighthouse I used my iPad 2 primarily for early scamps and brush tests, where as I used my iPad Pro and the awesome Procreate almost exclusively in the creation of Children's book Greedy Steve.
There is also a new wave of apps allowing you to pair iPad pro with your mac and turn it into a kind of bastadised Cintiq. Programs like Astropad and the brand new Astropad Studio are front of the queue which allow wireless or tethered connection. This solution isn't ideal on Astropad but I hear Astropad Studio has made some great improvements with latency issues.
There will always be a place for Wacom products in any illustrator’s/designers studio but its worth noting that the gap is definitely getting smaller between the heavy weight hardware/software giants(try googling the Xp-Pen or Huion) and their cheaper alternatives. Die hard illustrators will always flock to the Wacom banner in the same way creatives will always fight apple's corner but I was never die hard, I just want to draw and for a lot of illustrators just starting out the iPad Pro and apple pencil could a good alternative.
