Product Reviews

If you use your PC for artistic work, such as drawing or photo manipulation, then a mouse can be too imprecise and clumsy for what you want to do. Wacom's Volito 2 is designed to remedy this problem. It's a pen you can use with your PC.

It used to be the case with budget digital pens that the thickness and darkness of any line you made never varied, making pictures look clunky and unnatural. The Volito 2, on the other hand, is pressure-sensitive, so the thickness and boldness of the line varies according to how hard you press with the pen. Assuming your software supports this feature, the effect is very good. It allows you to create realistic brush strokes, applying digital paint in thin streaks or thick strokes. The effect works particularly

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well with crayon and paint tools.

The Volito 2 is relatively easy to use. Everyday functions - left-click, right-click, double-click -are all easily accessible. To move the cursor around without making a pen stroke, the tip needs to hover a few millimetres above the graphics pad's surface. This takes a little practice - if you lift the pen too far above the page, the cursor stops.

The active area of the pen's pressure pad is mapped exactly to your screen, so if you touch a corner of your pad, the cursor jumps to the corner of your screen. This makes things quick and easy, as no scrolling around is involved. The down side is that it can be fiddly working at the extremities of the screen - minimizing or closing windows, for instance - because you don't have much active space to work in.

The Volito isn't as comfortable at controlling everyday Windows functions as a standard mouse. If you practice a lot, you may become as adept with it as a mouse. But if that's all you intend to do with it, it's not worth the effort. If, on the other hand, you want to create digital artwork on your PC, but don't fancy the expense of professional-level graphics tablets, the Volito 2 will be a godsend. It will give you more precise control over your digital brushes and paints than a mouse ever could - and at only £40, it's a bargain.