I have bought myself a little tablet with the spare cash I had lying around because, frankly, I prefer drawing straight to the PC.

Anyway, my question is to anyone else that draws digitally: What's the best program to use?

I currently have Photoshop elements, GIMP and ArtRage on my system.

Well, a lot of people prefer Photoshop (specifically like, Photoshop 7, Photoshop CS-CS3)

I heard Manga Studio was alright, but that's only if you are making a manga.
But it all really depends on what kind of comic you're making.

I may be wrong but I think that GIMP does not allow for pressure sensitivity during the inking process. Photoshop Elements should be program enough to do what you want it to do. I know nothing about ArtRage.

All the above programs are great and you kind of just need to experience each of them to see which one meets your needs best. Personally I use both Photoshop and Illustrator. I love the clean lines from illustrator. Also you get to adjust the size of your drawing without distortions.

http://penciljack.com/forum/showthread.php?t=91188

Ryuthehedgewolf
Well, a lot of people prefer Photoshop (specifically like, Photoshop 7, Photoshop CS-CS3)

I heard Manga Studio was alright, but that's only if you are making a manga.
But it all really depends on what kind of comic you're making.

Not sure why Manga Studio would be just used to make Manga...

It has a great selection of brushes/pens/pencils. It helps you set up panels, word balloons, etc. Many nice 2 color effects. Perspective rulers. Symmetry rulers. Focus lines, tones.

It's perfect for any black and white comic. Or color too since you can export your work to photoshop.

Thanks for all the replies so far, you're all very helpful! :)

I feel I should outline the main problem I'm having, It's the lines. In Elements, they always look bad. At 1px it looks too rough around the edges, but when I make it bigger than that, it looks like I've blurred it. I want a program with cleaner lines than actually look decent.

I like Painter.

In other programs my lines come out really shaky because my hand is like that. It's especially noticeable in Photoshop. Before I used to use Open Canvas because it reduced the shakiness but then I got a classic version of painter that came with my tablet and it had brushes that worked great for me without even being tweaked. I like a lot of it's other brushes for coloring too so I recommend it. The lines look good at whatever size you use them.

YellowSnow
Thanks for all the replies so far, you're all very helpful! :)

I feel I should outline the main problem I'm having, It's the lines. In Elements, they always look bad. At 1px it looks too rough around the edges, but when I make it bigger than that, it looks like I've blurred it. I want a program with cleaner lines than actually look decent.

From what you're saying I suspect you're working at the final print/display size, right? When you're using a raster program you need to work big then scale it down for the final piece, otherwise it does end up looking chunky and pixelated. if you're working at the final size, try working at double the final size and scaling it down at the end. It should come out much cleaner if you do that.

Elements should be perfectly capable of creating quality looking pieces. Several of the students in my illustration classes use it and come out with good looking work.

Elements and Photoshop are both good. GIMP is popular but if you want to use it with pressure sensitivity the results are typically between really crappy and not working at all-- so I totally avoid ever using GIMP.

A good free basic paint program with excellent pressure response is paintNET. You might look into that.

Many raster programs, Photoshop (and elements) included, have an issue with lines looking wobbly unless you draw at 100%. Considering that if you ever hope to print your work, you need to work at 300 dpi at the actual dimensions of the printed product (that's more than 4 times larger than something the same size at screen resolution), that means you'll be zoomed in pretty close, which can be a pain in the asprin.

Manga Studio Debut (for raster) or EX (for vector) is really good for black and white line work. The inking tools are excellent and feel great. THe newest version does include color support, but most of the program is geared toward just black and white finished inks (and letters!). The cool thing about his program is that you can adjust the correction a bit, so that you can draw lines while zoomed out, but not end up with the wobbly lines.

I hear a program called Paint Tool SAI also has that feature, and also has good color support as well... I think it hits around $50 (similar to MS Debut, and much less than Photoshop)

On the vector side of things. I'm partial to Illustrator, which is expensive, but its free opensource counterpart Inkscape, has no pressure support. I think a lot of folks also draw in Flash. That always seemed weird to me because I regard flash as an animation program, but i guess the drawing tools are a little more intuitive.

that's my run down.

all my work is done with photoshop. i dont think i could get use to any other art program

Another vote for Manga Studio.

It's designed specifically to mimic inking with a brush or pen, and it does a damn fine job, in my humblest of opinions.

I love manga Studio for the inking. I do not like the tones too much cause when I reduce the size for online view, it does not look too good.

I do everything, except penciling, in photoshop. My inking so far looks best in photoshop due to the amazing size pressure.

I vote for paint.net also. And ArtRage is great for coloring (see my signature, I used AR for that) It might be great for inking cause you can get a bit of size pressure through the oil/brush tool, but if you have the free version, one layer can be a hassle if you are penciling and inking. But the full is only $25, so not too expensive :)

OrchardHeroes
All the above programs are great and you kind of just need to experience each of them to see which one meets your needs best. Personally I use both Photoshop and Illustrator. I love the clean lines from illustrator. Also you get to adjust the size of your drawing without distortions.

I use the same combination. Photoshop to do the rough sketch just because I'm more comfortable with it, and Illustrator to clean up the lines/ink and color (and depending on the piece, back to Photoshop for shading and resizing).

It really depends on what you want to do....

I for one don't have or want to take the time to learn PhotoShop, so I just use it for importing drawings... I use Paint tool Sai for Raw Fish? , because I want to get an ink brush look to the comic. Paint tool Sai has a veriaty of brushes and is preasure sensitive for use with tablets.
Now for when I color Dome Busta I start with the Paint tool Sai because the paint bucket tool is the best that I have seen, it leaves no white lines like other programs. But I do all the detail work in OpenCanvas. OpenCanvas's effects (blur, burn, fingertip, and so on) are much better, and can be controlled a lot better than in Sai.
All lettering is done in yet an other program, RealDraw Pro. This is a vector program which allows me to resize and move objects around on the fly.

Hope this was helpful, and hope you find whats best for you!

JustNoPoint

Ryuthehedgewolf
Well, a lot of people prefer Photoshop (specifically like, Photoshop 7, Photoshop CS-CS3)

I heard Manga Studio was alright, but that's only if you are making a manga.
But it all really depends on what kind of comic you're making.

Not sure why Manga Studio would be just used to make Manga...

It has a great selection of brushes/pens/pencils. It helps you set up panels, word balloons, etc. Many nice 2 color effects. Perspective rulers. Symmetry rulers. Focus lines, tones.

It's perfect for any black and white comic. Or color too since you can export your work to photoshop.

Well huh.
Good call :D