Rewind VR, The Mill and Space Ape Games are among the first to try out Wacom’s new tablet computer – and you can be the first to hear what they think of it.

Everyone likes to be first to try out one of Wacom’s latest products for professional designers and artists – and this month creatives from The Mill, Rewind and Space Ape Games have been given the chance to get their hands on the Wacom MobileStudio Pro.

They’ve just received a MobileStudio Pro, and one has given us his first, out-of-the-box impressions below. Once they’ve had a chance to put it through its paces over a month, we’ll be visiting each to hear their thoughts on what it’s done for them – and see what they’ve created using it.

The MobileStudio Pro is an extremely powerful, eminently portable drawing tool that’s both a tablet and a computer. Inside its sleek shell is an impressively specced Windows 10 PC with performance to rival any laptop – with either a Core i5 or i7 processor and lots of RAM and storage. Running Windows 10 means that you’re not limited to mobile apps, but can run the full versions of Photoshop, Illustrator, Painter, ZBrush and many more.

It’s the screen and pen that really make the MobileStudio Pro special. You can get 13- and 16-inch versions of the Mobile Studio Pro – both with highly detailed screens (with resolutions of 2,560 x 1,440 on the 13-inch model and 3,480 x 2,160 on the 16-inch model). They are also capable of showing bright colours, highlights and shadows, and subtle differences between shades – both can output at least 94% of the Adobe RGB colour space.

The Wacom Mobile Studio Pro – first impressions

Our first tester is Daryl Atkins (below), creative director at VR studio Rewind – which has created groundbreaking VR experiences for Björkthe BBC and Jaguar.

Here are Daryl’s initial thoughts:

“On opening the box, the first thing that struck me was the screen. The resolution is fantastic but what really stood out for me was the matte screen. It’s a joy to work on and really feels like drawing on paper.

“Although it’s a mobile wireless tablet, it certainly doesn’t lack on power. With the i7 processor I can render 3D scenes, paint and composite images directly on the tablet itself – something almost impossible to achieve on any other platform. Using lots of pieces of software in my daily workflow. I’m really excited about the potential of creating design work all on a single mobile device.”

Luke Kendall is a concept artist at Space Ape Games, creator of the Transformers: Earth War mobile game that won the TIGA Awards Game of the Year 2016. Here’s Luke trying out the MobileStudio Pro.

Our final tester is Charles Bigeast, a designer and illustrator at The Mill – the Soho-based VFX and content creation studio that recently worked on some of this Christmas’ best ads – including the Wes Anderson-directed spot for H&M and the widely praised Heathrow ad Coming Home for Christmas.