Looking for some advice on software/ hardware for drawing using an iMac. My son (11) is really keen on drawing and he’s pretty good at it. Comic style stuff at the moment but he’s also trying other styles. Can someone suggest a good program to get him started on a computer and also what type of hardware he would need. Cheers

The basic Wacom tablet, about £50 worth, is well regarded.

As for Mac software, I dunno, sorry.

Procreate app

Drat it. Seems like procreate is only available for mobile/iPad

Don’t know what your budget is but I’d probably be looking at a used iPad 6 and Pencil or iPad Pro and Pencil.

Using your existing iMac as computing power then there are drawing tablet graphics monitors options such as XP-pen and Huion. I’d still choose the iPad + Pencil ( 6th generation onwards) route just because for the budget it’s a more portable all in one option and Procreate is such a good app.

If content to draw off-screen on a graphics tablet then there are lots to choose from. Huion H420 USB is an example of a budget option

Software would most likely be something like Corel, Photoshop, Gimp etc. Maybe Artrage?

Just went through similar, ended getting an Adonit Pixel pen and procreate on an old ipad. Works really well.

I can also reecommend the 6th Gen iPad (or iPad Pro) + Pencil route. (total cost about £320 second hand)
My son really gets on well with the Procreate app (an extra £9.99).

If that isn’t what you want, then any cheap refurbed laptop with at least 8GB RAM will be fine with open source software like Gimp, Inkscape, etc. Worth getting an IPS screen with more than the old normal 1366×720 resolution.

I bought my son a £250 one from https://itzoo.co.uk/collections/cheap-laptops-tablets recently and as long as it’s plugged in to the mains, it’s fine. It even runs the Adobe Creative Cloud no problems as long as you’re not working on mega-big files.

(note that itzoo often release discount codes with as much as 15% off, so maybe subscribe to them and wait for one of those)

Cheers folks. I’ll look into the tablet route as we could probably do with an newer one.

You could try a pen/tablet type tool and Krita for Mac. Much cheaper than iPad route.

We have a school iPad quite new but Jnr is using Sketchbook (free) and an e-pencil thing.

Affinity Photo is a great alternative to Photoshop on a Mac. It costs about £50. Worth downloading and trying on a trial.

My daughter started with a second hand Wacom intuos off Ebay and has gone from strength to strength since. She’s now on a Huion gt-220 v2 which is incredibly good, next best thing to a Cintiq but at half the price. Something large like that is the best option if you’re doing art every day. Galaxy S tabs with the S pen are a good alternative to iPads.

Unfortunately Huions have got a lot more expensive in the last year or so, worth shopping around I guess.

Just in case anyone was looking at laptops – that Itzoo place I mentioned have just launched a 15% off code for the weekend: FLASH-NOV-15