Wacom Bamboo Capture Pen and Touch In Short

Wacom Bamboo Capture Pen and Touch offers a great value for its price. Great pressure sensitivity, compact & portable size, and it looks stylish. Works on all the main operating system. And is so affordable. Making it a great choice for a first tablet. And a very good Graphire replacement for some people

Probably the worst thing about this particular tablet is that the pen doesn’t come with an eraser on the back of the pen. Something that was not expected. But that’s fine in case you don’t need that particular feature

While the good old bamboo line (which is now replaced by the Intuos line of tablet) is aimed for non-professionals artists. You will be amazed by the number of professional artists that actually use it. It is not just that not everyone needs the features of the higher end graphics tablets. And the Bamboo line of tablets(and the newer version of it, the Intuos) are great even for those users. This is specially true in case you don’t care about tilt sensitivity of the pen, which is not supported in this tablet. Or if you don’t need a much bigger tablet.

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Wacom Bamboo Capture Pen and Touch is kind of old. To read my review of the newer version of this tablet. Wacom Intuos Pen and Touch Small & Medium Tablet Review (CTH480, CTH680), click here.

Pros of Wacom Bamboo Capture Pen and Touch

• Provides a very good value for the price. And there are tons of happy customers of it.
• The pen works without the need of a battery. Which is typical of Wacom tablet.
• Designed to be used by both left & right-handed people.
• Very fancy hardware and packaging, also typical of Wacom
• Offers 1024 level of pressure sensitivity. Which is enough for most uses.
• The tablet is easy to install. And in most cases, you will get your tablet running within minutes.
• Great choice for a first tablet. If you use Photoshop or a similar program regularly. You will be amazed by how much this device can speed up your workflow.
• Just like the case with many Wacom tablets. Wacom Bamboo Capture Pen and Touch works with Linux. An operating system that is kind of ignored by many hardware makers.

Cons of Wacom Bamboo Capture Pen and Touch

• Some people, specially the owners of the older lines of Bamboo tablet. Won’t like the paper-like texture of the Tablet. As it will feel like it wears out the pen nib much faster than the older version of the tablet.
• The pen has no eraser. Which may not a problem for many people. But the owners of older Bamboo tablets may expect the pen to have one.
• The natural scrolling is the default option in the touch option, which is not really natural for many people. Wacom is probably following suit with Mac OSX here.
• You can’t customise the pen buttons and the express keys so they would have different function for each application. (This is possible with the professional line of Wacom tablets:- Intuos 5 and the Intuos pro)
• This tablet is small for those who has a big screen. Like the 27″ iMac.
• The USB cable that comes with it is kind of short. So consider buying a new cable or getting a USB extender.

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Technical Specifications

• 4 Express Keys, which you can customise to do many things.
• Active Area: 5.8 inch x 3.6 inch (The area you can draw on).
• Works with both Mac & Windows
• 1,024 levels of pressure sensitivity
• The pen has no tilt sensitivity
• Comes With the following software:- Photoshop Elements, Corel Painter Essentials, and Autodesk Sketchbook Express
• Comes with few games
• Comes with the following software:-
  • Adobe Photoshop Elements
  • Autodesk Sketchbook Express
  • Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0 WE3
• To obtain the software, register the item with the included installation CD, which will take you to download. wacom.com.
• Grip pen with no eraser on the back
• Latest Drivers for this tablets can be downloaded from Wacom’s Website
• Supports Wacom Wireless kit. Which allows you to use the tablet without the usb cord. The wireless kit is sold separately from the tablet.

The Touch Features, and the trackpad-like experience

For a quite some time, I have been seeing people afraid of the touch feature in in the latest Wacom tablets(including the newer Intuos Pro & Intuos ones). There is to worry about that. The touch features doesn’t mean you won’t be able to lay your hand on it, it is smart enough to distinguish between the touch of your finger and your whole hand on it. And if that didn’t comfort you, you can turn of the touch feature in case you really didn’t like it. Though it doesn’t seem right to pay for a feature and not using it.

The touch features in Wacom Bamboo Capture Pen and Touch allows it to be used as a trackpad out of the box. It supports the same 1 to 4 fingers gestures of Apple Trackpad, like scrolling and zooming using two fingers. Making it a nice trackpad replacement. As well as mouse replacement. Though the surface is not as much smoother as Apple’s trackpad is. And doesn’t seem to have the same responsiveness of it. What of the nice things about the the finger gestures  is that they can be customised to do whatever you want as well.

The active area

The actual active area of Wacom Bamboo Capture Pen and Touch is about 5.8 inch x 3.6 inch. Which doesn’t cover the whole surface of the tablet. Like the case with many Wacom tablets. The actual active area you could draw on is marked by the grey mark near the corners of the tablet grey surface.

The Drawing Surface

The drawing surface of the tablet will seem rough for those who used older Bamboos. Which had a more gliding surface. This is caused by the paper-like texture Wacom has been incorporating into their tablet. Something many of the old users won’t like. giving that it tend to wear down the nibs faster.

The Pen that has no eraser

The pen looks stylish and nice to hold on your hand. And it comes with two keys that can be customised to streamline your work. You could customise them to do Undo/Redo. Or you could resize the brush size up and down with them

Some of the old users of Wacom tablet will be surprised to see that there is no eraser on the back of the pen. Which I considered to be one of the disadvantages of this model(The higher model of this tablet, Wacom Bamboo Create Pen. Comes with a pen that has an eraser by the way), because it was kind of unexpected.

To look at the bright side of the things. many people don’t use it at all, and that you could program one of the express keys to work as an eraser.

As Wacom Graphire Replacement

If you are one of Wacom graphite owners. Who are looking for a new graphics tablet to replace your older tablet, even though it works fine. But you have to replace it. Just because Mac OSX Yosomite doesn’t support your Graphire tablet. You seriously need to consider Wacom Bamboo Capture Pen and Touch. It probably doesn’t come with the cordless mouse that the Graphire comes with. And the touch feature may or not compensate for it. But as a graphics tablet. It is not lacking when it come to features. As long you don’t need an eraser on your pen.

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See Also

• Learn Photoshop CC With Pictures