The introduction of the Apple Mac app store earlier this year has opened up a wealth of ossam software to Mac owners in the form of easy to access apps, and the Sketch Book Express Mac app is no exception. Bringing your sketchpad to your Mac and funking it up with brilliant design features, Sketch Book Express is a great free download to try out your digital drawing capabilities on.
However, the reality is that it only really comes to life when it is combined with a sketch mat and pen, like the Wacom Bamboo, so that you can actually sketch straight onto the screen. Without one it makes drawing anything with your finger or mouse pretty tough going, as the pic I knocked up on Sketch Book Express with my finger and track-pad shows.
With the addition of the sketch mat and pen though, you unlock a whole new realm of creativity, giving you the opportunity to design some incredibly complex drawings with much more freedom than with paper based sketch skills, because of the ability to define layers, undo mistakes and move portions of the image around with ease. While there’s also an express version of it for iPhone and iPad, it’s definitely better on a Mac computer with one of Wacom’s pad and pens plugged into it.
The Sketch Book Express app is free right now at the Mac app store, but it also has a more professional older brother in Sketch Book Pro, but at around £44.99 you might want to try out your skills on the express version before you turn pro. Although you’ve only got to take a look at the video of the Iron Man speed sketch video to see what you can achieve if you’ve got a bit of talent and put you put your mind to it.
If you’re a first time user, there are plenty of tutorials online to help you get started to see what you can learn to do. It’s a piece of software which gets better the more you put into it. If you take your time to learn everything that it’s capable of and put in the effort to hone your skills you’ll be able to put together some pretty professional digital sketches.
Sketchbook Express app review: 4.1/5
