I like to have the side buttons as ALT and SHIFT for photoshop (wouldn't mind to have the top button mapped as right click!) and mid button and pan for 3D software. The surface pro 3 is advertised to suit artist, it certainly is, however it would be better to have the button customization! I use a Wacom 13HD on desktop, it is just too much to revert back and forth with the short cuts...totally mass up my work flow...
Surface Pro 3 Pen Button Customization
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Anonymous
I am a previous owner of a Surface Pro 2, and loved the capability it provided of customizing the button commands per program through the Wacom drivers. As a new owner of the surface Pro 3, I a very disappointed to discover that the same functionality is not available in the N-trig driver options. As an artist, the primary use of my surface is for drawing inside of programs like Adobe Photoshop. Not being able to customize the button functions on the new pen is detrimental to my efficiency as a digital artist. Without the ease of having quick access to specific commands through the pen buttons, I am forced to either dig through the menus and submenus of the program to execute a simple command, or connect a keyboard to use hotkeys. One of the greatest features of the surface is the ability to draw inside of photoshop as if it were a paper notebook, freeing me from my desktop work space and removing the requirement of the mouse and keyboard. Without the customization of these pen buttons, I lose that freedom.
I spoke to a Microsoft support tech this morning who informed me that "hopefully" in the next month or two, this feature will be added to the pen drivers. While this is a new product, and I understand that some features are still in development, this feature is crucial in the workflow of any artist using this device. I already own a desktop computer and a laptop; so again, the primary function of the Surface Pro 3 for me is drawing inside of programs like Photoshop without the need for a mouse and keyboard.
I don't know if any Microsoft representatives read these discussions, but if there is a way I could be included in any sort of pre-release developmental versions of drivers that introduce this capability, I would love to be a part of it and am happy to provide feedback from an artist's perspective.
Thanks for reading.
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Anonymous
2014-11-29T06:05:58+00:00 -
Anonymous
2014-11-28T15:02:25+00:00 Please, Define work properly. To me my pen work properly.
Come on, you know what he wanted to say!
Work properly = Be able to customize the two buttons on the side
Well, I have not seen that in any machine using Ntrig yet. The max I have seen is disable the eraser button using for that the Ntrig Control Panel applet.
And don't get me wrong, I think that would be a nice thing to have.
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Anonymous
2014-11-28T07:36:32+00:00 Please, Define work properly. To me my pen work properly.
Come on, you know what he wanted to say!
Work properly = Be able to customize the two buttons on the side
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Anonymous
2014-11-28T01:16:49+00:00 I wonder if the SP3 pen is a new model that Ntrig haven't supplied for other devices, and perhaps it needs a new driver.
Anyway, I'm not concerned by who exactly is the hold up, what I'd really like is for someone at Microsoft to at least acknowledge if this is being worked on and if so, what's the likely release date.
I run a game development studio and I'd like to get Surface Pro 3's for my artists to use with Mudbox and Photoshop, but I'm holding off on that investment until I can be sure the pens will work properly, the same way their current wacom tablet pens do.
Please, Define work properly. To me my pen work properly.
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Anonymous
2014-11-28T01:04:09+00:00 I wonder if the SP3 pen is a new model that Ntrig haven't supplied for other devices, and perhaps it needs a new driver.
Anyway, I'm not concerned by who exactly is the hold up, what I'd really like is for someone at Microsoft to at least acknowledge if this is being worked on and if so, what's the likely release date.
I run a game development studio and I'd like to get Surface Pro 3's for my artists to use with Mudbox and Photoshop, but I'm holding off on that investment until I can be sure the pens will work properly, the same way their current wacom tablet pens do.