sketching

The most impressive thing about PowerSketch is that it works on the fly. There are many photo editing or augmentation apps that allow you to change the features in a photo or make it look different than it should after the fact, but PowerSketch shows the final image as you view it, within the camera screen. Even more impressive, it can do the same thing for videos, making this one of the better photo manipulation apps on the App Store.

PowerSketch is a well-designed app from start to finish. Designed to look like a notebook and featuring a number of … Read more

The iPad has made it possible to create some very impressive pieces of music. It's hard to imagine something as complex and deeply intellectual as composition happening on a device used more often to play bird-tossing games, but there are some truly impressive compositions and even more impressive apps to create those works. One such app is Sketch-a-Song, providing a sleek, drag-and-drop interface to create songs with the tap of a button.

Sketch-a-Song starts by requiring you to register an account. You can choose to connect to Facebook, but Facebook integration is deep and the settings are not immediately … Read more

Photo-filtering apps can add artistic or sophisticated flair to all of your favorite photos. True to its name, One Touch Draw/Sketch & Paint lets you draw, sketch, and paint on photos, but it's marred by a messy interface that requires a lot of trial and error to get results.

Before you get started with One Touch Draw/Sketch & Paint, the app asks you to accept an ad agreement. You don't have to accept, but it installs ads on your status bar, browser home page, and more if you do. For an app that's centered around … Read more

Sketch n Draw Pad HD is a free drawing app for Android devices. With a variety of brushes, effects, and other drawing tools, it's a neat, little tool for drawing and painting, editing photos, and other basic image editing chores. It's free, but it's supported by Airpush ads. In the end, the ads are just too persistent and annoying to keep this app. That's a shame because Sketch n Draw Pad HD has potential. We tried it in a Samsung Galaxy S3 running Android 4.1.1.

Sketch n Draw Pad HD doesn't let you … Read more

Photo editors on Android are about as easy to find as a needle in a pile of needles. In its quest to differentiate itself from the pack, this app falls short, though. Picture Editor - Sketch Artist has a few cute features but is riddled with ads.

This app will show up with a different name -- Photo Sketch -- when you actually download it. It shows up with a ton of ads, too. These don't just take up a huge chunk of the app's screen, but hide in your status bar and browser, as well. Sharing from … Read more

Drawing 3D models can be a challenging experience, and learning to use CAD can take a lot of time. A powerful and yet easy-to-maneuver tool, SketchUp Pro for Mac, allows you to create new 3D models or modify existing ones in no time.

Available as free to try, at around 65MB in size SketchUp Pro for Mac takes a bit longer to download on slower connections, but it is well worth the wait. The installation is quick and easy, and the program is stable and performs very well. Even though the interface is easy to navigate and very intuitive, if … Read more

Taking photos with your Android device can be fun, but adding a bit of extra creativity to your photos and sharing them via your favorite social networks can make it even more fun. Sketch Guru allows you to add some great-looking effects to your photos. It is easy to install and has a very neat and user-friendly layout.

Once downloaded, Sketch Guru will quickly and easily allow any user to apply creative effects to their images. The installation process is supereasy. Although some of the effects are slow to apply, the software is fairly quick. The sheer number of effects … Read more

Paper by FiftyThree is an app that lets you sketch drawings and diagrams on your iPhone and iPad and share them with others. A free app from iTunes, Paper by FiftyThree installs easily.

There's barely an interface with Paper by FiftyThree. You can touch the screen of your device and draw anything you want, just as if you had a stylus and paper in front of you. There's a selection of tools available, but it pops out of the way when you don't need them. Paper by FiftyThree claims that its engine reacts to touch-screen pressure in … Read more

SketchUp for Mac is a 3D design app that allows you to create 3D models and, using an online service, get those models built. SketchUp for Mac installs easily but was not available from the App Store when we tested the software, instead requiring a download from the publisher. SketchUp for Mac is a free app, but there's a Pro version for additional cost with more features and capabilities.

SketchUp for Mac lets you create surprisingly complex and detailed 3D models, but there's a learning curve to doing so. The interface is surprisingly clean and easy to work … Read more