No doubt to the relief of third party suppliers of styli for the iPad, the optical stylus support for Apple’s tablet hinted at in a patent application uncovered earlier this year has so far failed to eventuate. While most of the styli on offer are basically fingers in a pen form factor, the Pogo Connect offers pressure sensitivity like that seen in graphics tablets from the likes of Wacom.
The Pogo Connect joins previous stylus offerings from Ten One Design, such as the Pogo Stylus and Pogo Sketch. While its the company's first pressure sensitive stylus, it isn’t the first pressure sensitive stylus for the iPad we’ve seen. The jaja stylus, which reached its Kickstarter funding goal in February, transmits pressure information from the pen to an iPad using high-frequency sound.
The Pogo Connect takes a slightly more conventional approach, relying on Bluetooth 4.0 for the transmission of the pressure information to the iPad. An LED on the stylus indicates when it has been successfully paired with the tablet, while its palm rejection capabilities lets users rest their hand on the display as they draw without worrying about leaving a big palm-shaped smudge on their artwork.
Ten One Design says its patent pending Crescendo Sensor technology is highly responsive and provides hundreds of levels of pressure sensitivity. It also works at all angles and doesn’t require any calibration. The stylus is also a solid state device, meaning there’s no easy to break moving parts. The Pogo Connect also boasts a magnetic tip system that allows the tips to be easily swapped out. Ten One Design says the system also provides the potential for it to release new interchangeable tips in the future.
The pen also packs a built-in radio transmitter that can be used to track it down using a radar-style view showing the distance to the device on an iPad or iPhone.
The Pogo Connect is powered by a single AAA battery and is currently supported by 16 apps, including Brushes, Zen Brush, PDFpen for iPad, Procreate, FlipBook HD, Sketch Club, SketchBook Pro, Art Studio, Good Notes, Colors, Paper by FiftyThree, Noteshelf, NotePad Pro, NoteBinder, IbisPaint and ArtRage.
Ten One Design currently has the Pogo Connect available for pre-order at US$79.95 with shipping set to commence on October 31.
Source: Ten One Design
