Scribbles: Drawing was Never More Simple

If you have ever just wanted to open an application and draw, you know that that can be difficult. There are plenty of graphics apps for Mac OS X, from free MS Paint alternatives like Seashore, to full-blown vector drawing applications like Illustrator. While both these applications serve different purposes, neither one is focused solely on simply drawing with a brush.

A few days ago, while browsing through the MacHeist Forums, there was some talk about an application called “Scribbles.” A quick Google search turned me to Atebits Software, where I downloaded Scribbles. This application has a simple interface and makes good use of Leopard’s CoreAnimation technology.

When you open up Scribbles for the first time, you will notice that the interface is very clean. The default brush, brush size, and brush color can be set in the preferences, so you can always start off with your favorites.

Clicking the button in the bottom-left corner brings up a palate that allows you to change your brush. In the screenshot below, from left to right, the brushes are as follows: Rainbow, Goo, Calligraphy, Charcoal, Bristles, Flat Hard, Flat Medium, Flat Soft, and and the last line was made by the flat hard brush and then gone over with the shading brush.

The next button over is for selecting the brush color. Clicking on the circle will bring up a color picking overlay, which looks similar to Apple’s color wheel. Just click and drag your mouse to select the color, and then the right side is for shade.

The slider along the bottom of the window is for brush size. Drag to the right to make it bigger, and to the left to make it smaller.

The last button (in the bottom right corner), opens up the layers overlay, which is something you don’t usually expect to find in a simple application like this one. From this view, you can add and remove layers, and change their opacity. You can scroll through layers by moving your mouse up and down, and the active layer is outlined in blue. This implementation of navigating layers feels like a sideways cover-flow, which is a nice touch. The application takes a very visual approach to UI, negating the use for inspectors and floating palates.

The top-right corner is where the canvas navigation resides. The first button lets you go back to the brush tool if you have another selected. The button with the arrows takes a clever approach to manipulating the layer. Clicking and dragging inside the inner-most circle allows you to move the layer, dragging in the second circle lets you rotate the layer, and the third circle lets you zoom the layer in and out. Clicking and dragging outside of the circles also lets you move the layer around. The hand tool lets you move all the layers at once, and the magnifying glass tool lets you zoom all the layers at once.

The View menu also had a few surprises for me. Scribbles lets you draw full screen, which is awesome for an application like this. Scribbles has an “infinite canvas,” meaning that there are no set boundaries for your drawing. You can pan and zoom endlessly. Scribbles offers a “Tracing Paper” view, where the background goes transparent and you can trace whatever is under the Scribbles window. Lastly, you can also have a grid overlaid on the page foreground.

When exporting your finished masterpiece, you have a few options. Scribbles supports exporting to 7 file formats, such as PNG, TIFF, BMP and GIF. If you would like to share your creation with the rest of the world, you can upload it to the Scribbles Gallery free of charge. There are some neat pictures there; I recommend you take a look.

Overall, I was impressed with Scribbles, as I didn’t really think very much of it when I first opened it. The use of CoreAnimation throughout the interface makes everything smooth and a joy to use. Some may be turned off by Scribbles apparent lack of features, but my impression of this application is “less is more.” It does one job, and it does it well.

With such an array of graphics applications available, you have many more to choose from if Scribbles isn’t for you. If you do decide that Scribbles is up your alley, you can purchase a license for $19.95 from Atebits Software.

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