The stylus is far from dead. For many of us, nothing beats the pinpoint accuracy you can get from using a good capacitive stylus, whether you're just cruising through the home screens on your Android device, drawing, or even typing on an on-screen keyboard. When Draw Something came out, I looked at my poor chewed up stylus and decided I had to get another one. After snooping around ShopAndroid.com I came across the Incipio Executive Stylus & Pen, and figured I'd give it a try. As someone who always carries a pen, I wanted to try and kill two birds with one stone, and this one does it.
If you're looking to pick up a stylus for general purpose use with an Android phone or tablet, I'd recommend the Incipio Executive to anyone. It's thick, making it easy to hold an use, has a nice high ball that works at just about any angle, and quality construction means it's not going to leak ink all over your shirt pocket or briefcase. Hit the break to read more.
The pen side is a nice, refillable ball point that uses the same cartridges as my standard Parker pen. Maybe I'm some sort of "pen snob," but the way a pen rolls and the ink flows is important to me. Even in today's modern age I still do a lot of writing by hand, so I'm picky. Yes, I have better pens, but this one is just fine. If you still need to sign things like checks or invoices all day, you'll appreciate where I'm coming from when I say it flows smooth enough to feel right.
Enough about the pen. Let's get to the meat and talk about the stylus end. It's made of standard capacitive soft rubber that's used for most styli, is hollow for easy maneuvering, and sits high off the body so you can use it at a pretty harsh angle. You might think that this sort of thing doesn't matter, and for tap typing or swooshing through home screens, you're mostly right. But when you try to use a capacitive stylus for any sort of drawing, you'll appreciate the soft hollow rubber and multi-directional angles you can get with the Incipio Executive. Digital artwork with a standard stylus (we're not talking Wacom digitizers or anything of that sort) takes a bit of practice. It's more like scratching or etching than it is drawing with pen and ink or pencils, and being able to hold the stylus at an angle that feels natural is important, at least for me. I'm no Picasso, but I enjoy scratching out a drawing or two on occasion, and the thick body combined with the full, round tip just works really well for me.
Whatever your needs for a stylus are, this one is certainly worth taking a look at. It works well with popular sketching apps like Sketchbook Mobile, more advanced editors like Photoshop Touch, and it makes a world of difference basting through the words in Draw Something.
Reader comments
Incipio Inscribe Executive Stylus & Pen review
Actually, the stylus is pretty dead except for niche markets (artists).
See how many new 3D phones are coming out? That'll be stylus-enabled phones by 2013.
That's a view...
As much as I hate it, lots of senior managers roams the offices and meeting rooms with their iPads (which made iPads one of the cornerstone of our strategy....), and most of them use them to take note with stylus.
So there is a market for stylus, at least to replace paper notebooks in organizations.
At least... that's my view :-)
I'll never get why people want to come down on something or declare it "dead" just because they don't like it themselves. Why can't you just accept that some people do like a stylus, just as some like phones with hardware keyboards? Is it the dominant segment of the market? No. But I think it's a good thing that manufacturers are realizing that there's a demand for these devices and serving the demand.
He expressed his opinion.
You expressed yours.
Why do you have to jump his bones just because he expressed his opinion? Why is it that some people are so sensitive to a contrary opinion?
He didn't state it as in opinion, he stated it as though it's fact. That's what I took issue with.
WTF DO YOU GUYS CARE WHAT OTHERS THINK?!..jfc
I think the problem, here, is not that he stated his opinion. It's that he phrased it in such as way as to imply that this article is pointless because of his opinion. It's a matter of civility. He's basically saying that the stylus is dead, and implying that suggesting or reviewing one is stupid.
The whole *point* of putting comments on these articles is to see what other people think, because sometimes people can have viewpoints that make you think differently. But too many people try to express their viewpoint as the only valid one, and that's not productive.
Given my artistic abilities, I'm sticking with Paper Camera.
I've never found a handwriting app that can make heads or tails of my chicken scratching either.
I wonder if poor penmanship is an indicator for no artistic skill?
Are you left handed as well?! lol
That goander character from DrawSomething can be pretty decent from what I hear. j/k
Seriously tho, thanks for the review Jerry, I've been wondering if you were using a tablet for your drawings on DrawSomething, guess this answers my question. Unfortunately, you'll have to suffer through my finger on GNex creations. :)
Are you interested in the upcoming Galaxy Note 10.1?
Tried to Google a bit but I'm at work.... can the tip be replaced?
He said "the stylus is pretty dead except for niche markets". That's not an opinion. An opinion would be, "I think/believe the stylus is pretty dead except for niche markets."
Learn what the reply button is for.
The reply button is for a dead/niche market.
Is that your opinion?
opps
No it's a fact......
Can't make those tire marks without positraction which was not available on the Buick Skylark....Had to throw some My Cousin Vinny in.....
I can't believe no one's commented on the drawing of the Unibomber... Oh wait, that's Jerry!
Seriously, nice looking stylus. Thanks for the review, Jerry. Did you draw the picture of you?
They sell these at VZW now for 24.99, Plus if you have a business discount you get up to 35% off.
Butter
Zoogue is giving away 50,000 of their new stylus pen. It just costs $5 shipping. It's a bit too thin for me, but it's definitely well made. It cracks me up that the Zoogue web site lists four different products:
Ipad Stylus & Pen
Galaxy Tab Stylus & Pen
Kindle Fire Stylus & Pen
Xoom Stylus & Pen
It appears that if they make a case for a device, then they decided to make a line item for a stylus for that device. It's a cool company.
Seems a bit "scammy" since it doesn't let you pay with paypal and "like" with your facebook account within their website (I was signed into facebook...but it wanted me to sign in again? what's with that?)
I played around a bit with a stylus on draw something, and it was a noticeable improvement to my artistry (mostly because my fat hand wasn't blocking my view of what I was drawing), but not enough to get excited about. I'm looking forward to an open bluetooth standard for active styli with pressure sensitivity, and the like. I was super intrigued by the flyer, but by the time it was affordable it was too outdated. Will be shopping for a new tablet q4 this year, we'll see what's out by then.
Out my league with you techie guys but thought I'd throw out my quesiton. Just got first (Android) smart phones so husband and I are revitalizing our gray cells learning all the in's and out. Husband has large hands and thus terrible trouble with onscreen keyboard so i was thinking a stylus would be a good solution for him. Yes? If yes, this stylus? he keeps a pen in his pocket already. We're old, so probably use a lot of "dead" technology! (He writes websites, which is pretty impressive for an old guy!)
I've used styli before. Didn't care for them. I'll explain why.
In my experience, I've had problems with them. The soft rubber on them is too soft. I have to push hard when using the onscreen keyboard and the screens don't scroll well and just leaves me frustrated.
Now, if I've been doing something wrong or if there's a better way to use them I don't know about, and it's a good possibility, then please give me some advice. I'd appreciate it.