Input Devices : Graphics Tablet

Graphics tablets are mainly used by professional graphics designers. Using a graphics tablet a designer can produce much more accurate drawings on the screen than he could with a mouse or other pointing device. A graphics tablet consists of a flat pad (the tablet) on which the user "draws" with a special pen called a stylus. As the user "draws" on the pad the image is created on the screen. The pad on which the user draws can be any size from A5 to A1 (eight times as large as an A4 page). Drawings created using a graphics tablet can be accurate to within hundredths of an inch. Graphics tablets are also known as graphics digitisers.

The stylus that the user draws with may have a button on it which will act like a mouse button. Sometimes instead of a stylus a highly accurate mouse-like device called a puck is used to draw on the tablet.

Graphics tablets are often used to provide input to Computer Aided Design packages.

GCSE ICT Companion 04 - (C) P Meakin 2004