There are not many digital painting tools that support pressure sensitivity. Pressure-sensitive drawing tablets were popularized by Wacom, and they’ve made the best ones around.
Like Clip Studio Paint, this software is amazing for creating digital art, and it has some truly awesome pressure sensitivity capabilities. Both are both popular digital painting programs that offer a lot of features for artists. With these you can really let your creativity run wild!
If you’re serious about digital painting, a pressure-sensitive drawing tablet is a must-have. But if you don’t have one, that’s okay. In this tutorial, I’ll show you how to turn on pressure sensitivity in your drawing app.
There are two programs that will let you do a pressure-sensitive painting without a pressure-sensitive tablet: Krita and Manga Studio.
👉 Krita is a digital painting software that can be found on Linux, Windows, and macOS. It is an excellent digital painting program and includes pressure sensitivity support for all the brushes it offers.
👉 Manga Studio is a digital painting program that is only supported on Windows and macOS. It has pressure-sensitive support for its pencil, pen, ink, and paintbrushes.
How to Turn on Pressure Sensitivity in Krita
Follow the steps to turn on pressure sensitivity in Krita:
- Go to the settings menu of Krita (Ctrl + Shift + S)
- Look for ‘Configure Shortcuts’ in the menu on the left
- Press ‘Add’ in the top right
- Choose ‘ Pressure’ in the first row
- In the second row, choose ‘Toggle on pressure sensitivity’
- Click ‘OK’ and exit the menu
Now, when you are using a brush in Krita, you can toggle pressure on/off by pressing Shift + P.
Setting up the Pressure Curve:
You can also set the pressure curve according to your need under ‘Input curves’.
- Go to ‘Configure Shortcuts‘ again.
- Choose ‘Input Curves‘ for the second row.
- You can configure your own pressure curve.
However, you are not limited to that. You can make your own pressure curve.
- Press ‘Add’ in the top right to add a new curve.
- Choosing Filter will give you a choice between various filters.
The ‘Nearest Neighbor’ filter is a bitmap interpolation that is very fast but can produce aliasing artifacts. The Gaussian smoothing filter is somewhat slower, but the result is antialiased.
Choose whichever works best for you.
Problems Regarding Sensitivity of the Tablet?
There are a few problems that might occur with the pressure sensitivity:
- If your pen is too far away from the tablet, Krita won’t register the pressure.
- If you are using a graphics tablet with a screen, the pressure might be different on the screen than on the tablet.
Maximum Pressure Sensitivity
Krita is capable of displaying pressure values between 0 and 1.
However, the pressure values that your best tablet for Krita sends to the app might be different. In that case, you need to change the pressure curve to ‘Device’.
To maximize the pressure sensitivity in any device, you need to find the pressure value that is at the peak of the pressure curve.
Once you have found that pressure value, you need to set it as the ‘Maximum pressure’ in Krita. To do this follow the steps:
- Go to ‘Configure Shortcuts‘ and choose ‘Input Curves‘.
- In the Input Curves dialog, select your pressure curve and press ‘Edit’.
- In the Edit Curve dialog, look for the Maximum pressure field and set the pressure value to the one you found earlier.
- Press OK and close all dialogs.
Pressure sensitivity in Krita – FAQs:
Q: Why is pressure sensitivity not working in Krita?
A: There are a few reasons why pressure sensitivity might not be working in Krita. Make sure that you have followed the steps given above to turn on pressure sensitivity. If that does not work, try changing the pressure curve to ‘Device’.
Q: The pressure values I am getting are different from what is shown in Krita. What can I do?
A: You might need to change the pressure curve to ‘Device’ if the pressure values that your device sends to Krita are different from what is shown in Krita.
Q: How can I find the Maximum pressure value for my device?
A: To find the pressure value of your device, start by choosing ‘Device’ under the pressure curve. Set the pressure delta and minimum pressure to 0 and maximum pressure to 1.0 then save the configuration and close Krita.
Now, when you draw in Krita with crosshairs turned on (View > Display Crosshairs), set brush opacity at around 30% and keep drawing from one corner to another until you notice a change in pressure until you see a line drawn in Krita at some pressure level
Once you have found that pressure level, note down the pressure value next to it. Now open up that pressure-sensitive brush again and set the Maximum Pressure value to that number.
Close all dialogs without saving and restart Krita.
Q: Why is the pressure sensitivity different on my graphics tablet and the screen?
A: If you are using a graphics tablet with a screen, the pressure might be different on the screen than on the tablet.
Conclusion: Why You Should Turn On Pressure Sensitivity Right Now?
Pressure sensitivity is an important feature for digital painting.
Pressure sensitivity allows you to control the opacity and other brush settings with pressure, so you can create different effects by controlling how hard you press the pen against your tablet. Just like having the best Osmo device, you also need a great tablet for this.
In this article, we have shown you how to turn on pressure sensitivity in Krita and how to maximize the pressure sensitivity on your device.