"Square" wacom and widescreen monitor - a problem?

[Clean3d]

Hi everyone,
I've got a 6x8 Graphire tablet, and I'm looking into getting a new monitor (an LCD, because of the additional desk space, and they just look cool ;)). I was wondering if anyone had experience with a widescreen monitor and a "normal" size Wacom. Do you get used to the pen moving faster sideways than up/down? Or would it be better just to find a 4:3 aspect ratio monitor?

Thanks!

[Slash]

I have a 4:3 intuos 3 a4 tablet and a 22" widescreen monitor. I dont know if this applies to the graphire as well, but in the driver settings you can enable "force proportions", so that the active area of the tablet matches that of the screen. (i loose a thin strip at the bottom of my tablet, i never notice that loss.) This lost area might be more of a problem on smaller tablets tho.

//edit: I've heard that some people just learn to live with the slight stretching that occurs if you dont force the proportions, but i guess this will mess up your hand-eye coordination somewhat. (draw a perfect circle on the tablet, and it appears as an oval on screen - so you adjust your coordination. that cant be good.)

//edit2: in my opinion, the extra screen real estate you get from a widescreen monitor more than weighs up for that thin strip of drawing area i loose on the wacom.

[Sepulverture]

Yeah dude, I use my 4x5 wacom on a 22" widescreen. No problems at all.

[life on the sofa]

i dont use a wacom, YAY FOR POOR PEOPLE!

[Juhani Jokinen]

I have a A4 ( I guess it's 6x8 ?) Intuos 3 and a 19'' hp monitor and I've never noticed anything. I've also worked with an A5 intuos with this monitor and no problems at all.

-JJ

[Basil]

i used to use force proportions for my 6x8 tablet, but i went to a scott robertson workshop and he told us that using force proportions will form bad drawing habits. for example, a circle drawn on your tablet will be an ellipse on a widescreen monitor etc. i switched to the regular settings where i just use the top 2/3 of my tablet and i'm hoping to upgrade to a widescreen tablet soon, but i guess it's all about what works for you.

[skidu]

i used to use force proportions for my 6x8 tablet, but i went to a scott robertson workshop and he told us that using force proportions will form bad drawing habits.

Isn't it the otherway around? Force proportions crops the tablet area so it there's a 1:1 aspect ratio with monitor. With if off, then a circle = an ellipse :wink:

[Clean3d]

Thanks for the advice everyone! If I get a widescreen, I guess I'd definitely use forced proportions, so I wouldn't get into any bad habits with circle-drawing. I'm on Linux, though, so I'm not exactly sure how well it'll support this (looking at the manual page for the driver, it looks like it shouldn't be too big of a problem, but we'll see).

I'm still a little hesitant to go get a widescreen just because of the lost area on the tablet or the sides of the screen (depending on how the driver works). There are times when a 6x8 seems a little small and cramped, and cutting of 16 square inches probably wouldn't help any, but again, you probably get used to it.

Anyway, thanks for all your help, everybody!