Microsoft has just announced one of the coolest looking pieces of hardware an artist could have. And there are some cool apps too.
As you might have heard, Microsoft was holding an interesting event, where a couple of nice products were announced. One of those products is called Microsoft Surface Studio. It’s the latest addition to the Surface family of products, which is aimed specifically at artists. It’s not cheap by any means (about $2,3k), but it doesn’t hurt to have a better look at it.
At the center you’ve got a huge 28-inch LCD panel, which is connected to a base with a zero-gravity hinge. This allows you to use the device as a standard desktop and immediately turn it into a drawing surface. It’s as if you could turn iMac into a Wacom. Surface Studio also works with Microsoft’s Surface Pen and a very cool gadget – Surface Dial.
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Surface Dial is a small puck-like device, which serves as a rotating controller. You put it on the screen itself, a contextual menu pops up and it lets you control all the things in the world: colors, brushes, volume, screen brightness and so on. The functionality of this device is entirely contextual and is defined by the app. There’s built-in palm rejection for the touch screen, so no false inputs.
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The most interesting things in this device is the number of new apps, which are specifically aimed at artists. Here’s a little video with some of the cool applications, which work with this device.
Sketchable, Bluebeam and especially Mental Canvas look absolutely amazing. Mental Canvas is especially interesting, since it allows to draw 2d images and build 3d environments with them. The images you get with it look very unusual.
I’m not sure Microsoft Surface Studio is going to blow up the market and become the new standard, but if you’re looking for a Christmas gift for an artist, this could be it.