Which laptop

[Alan]

Which laptop would you suggest for using with TVpaint, and which would you avoid? And why?

Cheers Alan

[Paul Fierlinger]

I'd select the one with the biggest monitor. I can't see anyone working successively on a laptop unless their style is of a stick figure nature.

[Klaus Hoefs]

I do. Recently with a Mac Pro 15''. Before it with Alienware 17'' which was too heavy.
At home, second monitor is strongly recommended.
Also I think Tony (Dusko) does.

[Klaus Hoefs]

Ps: I run TVP mostly on WIn at the Mac, but have it also on MacOS.

[Paul Fierlinger]

Well, I know about Tony and that's why I said

unless their style is of a stick figure nature.

I said this in gist as well, expecting objections, but I think it can really inhibit anyone's ability to work efficiently while utilizing all the TVP panels and plugins -- at least in comparison to a proper sized double monitor setup. I say this also because I have TVP on a 17" lap top myself now, which I use for teaching; not real animating but just demonstrating TVP and have to constantly wonder how anyone can work with this on a constant basis. Obviously I don't belong in this thread so I'll bow out and be a lurker.

[meslin]

Hi Michael,

I've used TVPaint on a WinXP Tablet (HP TC4400) for three years. I used a second monitor about half of the time, positioned directly above the tablet screen (which I put on an angle for ergonomics). Sometimes my arm gets tired or stiff and then I switch to an external Wacom tablet; works fine both ways. I recommend getting a Contour Shuttle or Nostromo Speedpad to use for shortcut keys and making an organized custom panel to harbor your shortcut buttons. This is how I've gotten around the 1024x768 display on the tablet.
If you are working in 1080p or higher, you will not be able to get a tablet (or any laptop, probably) that will run TVPaint quickly for less than $2,000, and even then it's less than ideal.
For lower res stuff, any laptop with a Wacom digitizer will run TVPaint just fine. But for high res stuff it will be expensive and annoying to be missing the details on little screen. A modern rule of thumb might be "don't TVPaint on a screen with fewer pixels than your intended output."

Good luck!
David

[Alan]

Thanks all for your informative replies. At the moment I use a PC with an old 21" IIyma CRT monitor. Working elsewhere will be handy.

So, to summarize; as powerful as possible with a screen as big as possible. But practicalities may mean something smaller. Most important is to make sure screen resolution is not less than that you intend to work with. (I would not have thought of this.)

Sitting closer to a laptop screen will, I assume, compensate somewhat for the smaller screen, so resolution is perhaps more critical. As laptops often come with wide screen format does this help to find more space for the tool panels, or are they just wider?

A further thought has occurred to me. I guess some laptops have HDMI outputs (Do they?) would it be possible to use a large LCD TV as a monitor, and could it be configured as a second screen?

Cheers Alan

[slowtiger]

HDMI: this is a tricky subject, and I strongly recommend you test this at your hardware dealer. HDMI has been seriously crippled on the software side, and all claims of manufacturers that "everything works with everything" are useless once you bought a bunch of hardware and sit at hme frustrated because no item will speak to the other.

[ematecki]

As usual once the marketing guys takes over what the technical guys spend so much time and effort to get it right :(