Pencil app gives a paper-and-pen feel to digital drawing

Pencil, FiftyThree's new iPad pen, is now on sale. It was created by the same company that launched Paper, the acclaimed iPad drawing app.

To activate Pencil on your iPad simply open the Paper app and press the pencil tip to the screen. Once activated, a number of tools appear onscreen. Select any one of them and you've transformed the Pencil into a specific type of writing utensil, including an ink pen, bold marker, watercolor brush, thick ink pen, and soft lead pencil.

Combined, the Pencil and Paper software offer a sleek, simple look, with no menu bars and relatively few icons. Ideas can be grouped in moleskine-esque journals, emphasizing the physical paper-and-pen feel of the technology.

Any pages can be shared on social media or email, and the moleskine journal function can print digital work as a physical book.

Check out the video below to learn more about Pencil. Read Archinect's detailed product review here.

Given their size, AEC Giants possess the resources and scale to research and test the bevy of software and hardware solutions on the market. Some have created internal innovation labs and fabrication shops to tinker with emerging technologies and create custom software tools. Others have formed R&D teams to test tech tools on the job site.

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