Rosa Golijan, over at MSNBC’s Gadget Blog reviews the device:

The Inkling’s ability to spit out vector graphics is incredibly useful because it means that your drawings are represented by mathematical expressions instead of existing as a grid of pixels (like their counterparts, raster graphics). This means that you’ll be able to tweak individual pen strokes or even scale your drawing to the size of a bus — without ever losing quality.

The fact that the Inkling can save work in layered files, Spratt told me, is a huge deal because artists make mistakes:

The more detailed review comes from Aegir Hallmundur who posted on his blog Ministry of Type. He’s written about how it lays down a line, the devices signal and recording ability, the software needed, and what a drawing looks like when imported into Photoshop, Illustrator or as SVG.

The Inkling feels very much like a tool for designers more than illustrators. If you sketch rough ideas – layouts, lettering, schematics and the like, you’ll find it very useful. If you want to record your sketchbook of illustrations, you certainly could, but it might cramp your style having to use that pen – Wacom themselves say it’s good for preparatory drawings, and I agree. I don’t use ballpoints very often for a couple of reasons – I don’t particularly like the quality of line they offer, and the ink smells bad. For the sheer convenience of this tool though, I could live with both.

The initial release of the pen was supposed to be in September, but the website now says mid-November. You can sign up over at Amazon to get an email when it becomes available.

Anyway, here’s the one he posted. I’m more impressed with the engineering that went into the manufacturing process.

He’s also posted videos on how coloring pencils, pencil sharpeners and retractable pens are made.

Each gag cartoon begin as a very light rough pencil sketch drawn on a piece of smooth-surfaced Strathmore Bristol board using a regular 2H pencil. I ink directly over my pencil work with Winsor & Newton Black Indian Ink using a pair of dip pens and brush. The pen nibs demonstrated in this video include a Hunt 512 and a Speedball 513EF in a Koh-I-Noor Penholder (No. 127N). I favour the 513EF for 99% of all my cartooning.

The original cartoon art measures 11″ x 14″ and is then scanned into Adobe Photoshop, where it is coloured in CMYK format. The finished cartoon is then emailed to the editors at Reader’s Digest Canada for consideration.

Lately I’ve gotten a number of bad batches of Strathmore bristol. The problem with them was they bled. Inking on them with a dip pen resulted in your line getting fuzzy and hairy-looking. Totally unusable. At first MAD sent me some boards that did that, and I couldn’t use them. I wrote it off as an anomaly… maybe somebody at the Strathmore plant spilled their Pepsi into the bleaching vat during that batch or something. Then I ordered a pack of 25 sheets of 4 ply 500 boards from an online art supply house, and all 25 boards did the same thing. Bled all over the place. I managed to use these boards anyway by spraying them with a photo-retouch fixative that is used to spray photographs so that someone can add painted tints and colors to them directly on the photo’s surface. This was an expensive solution, not to mention that aerosol can of fixative was so toxic I had to spray it outside while holding my breath and then run away. I am sure there is a hole in the ozone layer directly above my house.

Just the other day I got a pack of 25 sheets of 500 series from Dick Blick. Fortunately before I spent a lot of time penciling on one of the new boards, I tested it with the ink. It bled like a stuck pig. That’s three batches from three different sources in about 18 months that was bad. That’s not an anomaly, that’s a trend.

#1. The iPad.

It is this year’s most anticipated, most hyped, and most sought after gadget. I’ve been using an iPad since September and I can’t endorse it enough. The I draw on it (ArtRage), get my news (Flipbook, Pulse News, CNN, NPR), play games (Words with Friends), watch movies (Netflix), listen to music (Pandora), socialize (Facebook, Twitter) and use several productivity apps (Dropbox, SimpleNote, Plaintext). Many a blog posts are composed while on my morning train commute. Consider that Computer World released a report predicting sales of smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices will out sell PC shipments within the next 18 months. There is a dramatic shift happening and it’s happening faster than anyone could have predicted.

It really is a game changer. News organizations are scrambling to get into the tablet market. King Features recently released their DailyINK for iPhone, iPod Touch and have an iPad version set to release soon and I can’t wait for it. I’ll finally get to consume the comics I love on a portable device that can give them the screen real estate they need. If you can still get an iPad for Christmas, do it. Tell your spouse that you need it for marketing research. It is the future. Besides, The Daily Cartoonist looks fabulous on the iPad.

It looks like Amazon is sold out. Check back for new inventory.

#2. 40 A Doonesbury Retrospective

Garry Trudeau’s Doonesbury is an iconic original and it recently hit the 40 year mark and still going strong. There have been two excellent books released to coincide with the anniversary – “Doonesbury and the Art of GB Trudeau” by Brian Walker (read my review) and 40: A Doonesbury Retrospective. Andrews McMeel published “40″ and like other complete collections (note: “40″ isn’t a complete collection), the attention to detail is first rate – really a work of art as much as the comics inside it.

As much as I love comics, I have to admit I don’t enjoy reading them in the paper like I did in my youth. I much prefer to sit down with a collection and take in the story-lines at one time rather than over a span of days. “40″ allows your to read those story arcs and see Garry’s drawing style change of time. A wonderful collection.

#3 Duck: Birds and Pencils

Florian Satzinger is a Austrian animator designer/illustrator. He was a student of Ken Southworth (Disney, MGM and Hanna-Barbera animator and animation director). He posts his sketches on his Paperwalker blog. I’m not even sure I know how I found out about his blog, but I’ve been a fan ever since. He published a collection of his sketches in book form through Brands Studio Press. It’s only 48 pages and costs $24.95, but it’s worth it. The line art is creatively beautiful, zany and fun. I don’t know how large the print run was. Get one while you can.

#4 Bug

You don’t have to run out and get this. It’s free. As in a webcomic free. Bug is a new comic created last year by Adam Huber. What I enjoy about Bug is the multi-punchline strip approach. The bugs are black and white, not even sure if they’ve got names, but they’re likably amusing. Adams has great comedic timing and delivers simple line art that matches the humor. If there was a future in syndication, I’d say get this guy a contract. He updates 5-6 times a week. If he sells a book collection, I’m first one in line.

#5 Dropbox

So this last one isn’t directly cartooning related, but last summer it completely saved my… assets… and I’ve become a big proponent. We all know we need to back up our stuff, but sometimes it’s a hassle. Since all but one cartoonist (Patrick McDonnell?) uses a computer in some capacity, you’ll want some kind of back up system. DropBox is an automatic syncing service. It installs on Macs, Windows and Linux and places a folder on your computer. Everything that you save in that directory is automatically backed up to their servers. If you install it on multiple computers, the file is synced to all computers automatically. It also allows “versioning” – you can see early drafts of changes you made in a file (last 30 days). It’s really convenient, and best of all you can get 2GB for free. You can buy more space if you need it.

Charlie Brown and Snoopy are given top billing on the silkscreen printed covers, whilst the anniversary logo is debossed on every notebook. The interior features illustrations of the characters with inspiring quotes, a set of stickers, and a family tree tracking all possible connections among the whole Peanuts gang, their love crushes, their likes and dislikes.

Notebook appear to cost about $15.

The only thing better would be for him to get a webcam and do a live/recorded session of him working his magic. I’d pay for that like it was a porn peep show.

The question today: What tool (pen, pencil, paper, software, etc.) do you keep in your studio – that you use regularly – that is pretty unique or you don’t think anyone else uses?

In n earlier post, I’d driveled on at length about my favorite pen nib, the Hunt ##101 Imperial, shown above. I use a dip pen nib every day of my life and am therefor a leetle obsessive about them; a bad one can send me into a funk that poisons the whole household and probably scars my children permanently, but give me a good nib and I sing & dance like Donald O’Connor (which also scars my chi- but, never mind). Nibs can vary in quality within their species. Get 30 nibs of the exact same kind and hold them in your hand; half of ‘em are OK-ish, 10 of ‘em are decent and 5 are sweet, and, if you’re real lucky, one is immortal, a Nib for the Ages (that adds up to 31, I know, I know). It all depends what you’re after, of course. I’m after one that draws fine lines effortlessly, on edge or square on, upside down even, and does fat lines without spreading out too far and compromising the ink flow. It’s usually immediately apparent how well the nib is going to perform, just by the feel of it dragging on the paper, or the tiny variations in shape of the tines. It’s this finely calibrated nib-sense that makes my wife’s eyes roll audibly in her head if I so much as say the word “nib”.

I think we all get a bit obsessed about a tool of our trade. I actually enjoy reading about them.

What tool in your trade are you obsessed about?