Hello. I am currently struggling with simple drawing... I want to draw nice art and everything, but, right now I can't even draw a circle without it looking oblong. I have decent experience drawing on paper, but I want to move to PC. One of my other issues is how am I supposed to draw without rotating the tablet or whatever? When I drew a lot in art class, I had to rotate my paper a lot. I am aware that you can rotate the canvas, but I'd like to forget about that altogether. What's especially hard is trying to get used to a 6x3 workspace.

I moved this to Krita forum as I assume that's what you're using to draw

google01103 wrote:I moved this to Krita forum as I assume that's what you're using to draw

Ah, yes, sorry about that. I was registering for the Krita forums, and there was a big confusion.

If you take a coin, put it on your tablet and trace it around, and the result is oblong, the aspect ratio of your tablet is set wrong for your monitor. That's a pretty generic problem, and depending on the OS and depending on the OS, the desktop environment, there are utilities to fix that for you. For the rest, canvas rotation _is_ the equivalent of rotating the paper -- you cannot rotate the tablet itself, unless it's a tablet monitor like a cintiq.

It's simply a matter of exercise and getting used to the hand/eye (dis)-coordination (assuming you're not using a cintiq or equivalent).

I always try to start every drawing session with drawing a few circles, to get used to the motion. Try to draw from the shoulder rather than the hand.

Also, you probably want to draw with some smoothing on top of your lines, e.g. using the Stabilizer in the tool settings for the brush.

boudewijn wrote:If you take a coin, put it on your tablet and trace it around, and the result is oblong, the aspect ratio of your tablet is set wrong for your monitor. That's a pretty generic problem, and depending on the OS and depending on the OS, the desktop environment, there are utilities to fix that for you. For the rest, canvas rotation _is_ the equivalent of rotating the paper -- you cannot rotate the tablet itself, unless it's a tablet monitor like a cintiq.

That is actually a good point. My monitor's aspect ratio is 16:10. What can I do regarding this?

ratchetmiles wrote:That is actually a good point. My monitor's aspect ratio is 16:10. What can I do regarding this?

If you are using KDE you can use system-settings/input-devices/graphics-tablet. In the Tablet tab is a button "Map tablet to screen area".
There you can click "Set Screen Proportions" If you are using a 16:9 tablet with your 16:10 screen that will leave you with a little less usable tablet space on the side or sides (you can move the area) but if you draw a circle then (don't use a metallic coin for testing it could interfere with the detection) it should resemble a circle and not an elipse.

torpak wrote:There you can click "Set Screen Proportions" If you are using a 16:9 tablet with your 16:10 screen that will leave you with a little less usable tablet space on the side or sides (you can move the area) but if you draw a circle then (don't use a metallic coin for testing it could interfere with the detection) it should resemble a circle and not an elipse.

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Oh god...I drew without checking this for 6 months. I knew something was wrong but everybody just said: "you just have to get used to it"
Well, thank you, Torpak, for saving me countless years of trouble.

nuttshell wrote:...

........
Oh god...I drew without checking this for 6 months. I knew something was wrong but everybody just said: "you just have to get used to it"
Well, thank you, Torpak, for saving me countless years of trouble.

I am sure in a few more moths you would have gotten used to the distortion. The human mind is very fexible
Anyway glad i could help a little.

Another quick thing to consider is the placement of your tablet with respect to the monitor. Always align them properly before drawing i.e. the width dimension of the monitor parallel to the width dimension of your tablet. It's a small point and very easy to miss, but with significant consequences.