ArtRage Vitae Mobile Painting

Every time I open and close the application the brush, canvas presets disappear and you have to reset each and every one each time. As you can imagine this gets tedious and monotonous and when working on projects your continuity and inspiration are hampered. I have mentioned this issue now for years as it is the same with ArtRage Pro version and they have yet to reply or rectify the problem. They are happy enough to take payment for the application so good business ethics would hope they would address any problems promptly.

I’ve been a user of ArtRage on the desktop for years so as soon as I got an iPad Pro, I was keen to try the mobile version too. I was given pause by the very negative reviews suggesting that there was a large amount of lag and that there was no slider to set the brush sizes. I’m happy to report that both of these issues weren’t evident during my painting experience this morning. I’m using the latest 2021 M1 iPad Pro with an Apple Pencil (v2) and there was very little lag when using the brush tools (certainly no more than when I’ve used ArtRage on my MacBook). Using the roller produced a little lag but again, no more than I’ve experienced on the desktop version. Accessing the brush slider is simple - hold the Pencil on the bottom left corner (where the % brush size indicator is) and drag inwards and a quarter-circle brush size selector will appear. I’m really looking forward to getting creative with this version of one of my favourite creative tools. If I find that in use, lag becomes apparent or other issues arise, I will amend this review accordingly but for now, I’m really impressed.

Sure, there is not a massive difference between this and the old app, but there are slight improvements if the artists looks for them. Love the depth slider and the real oil effect it creates. Like all such art apps, we need to experiment and explore. Only one criticism....not enough oil brush variety...great app though Well done Artrage team. Sam

I have used ArtRage for more than 10 years. This version is the same as the previous iPad version with a few minor additions. Not worth calling a new app! It is still the most laggy painting app out there, why haven’t they done anything about that? Surely if you release a new version it will work without lag, I have the latest iPad Pro! You cannot adjust the brush size with a slider, what an error, every app has that function! I hope they release some updates because it’s note worth buying as it stands.

ArtRage has long been a favourite app of mine, but the old app was dated and badly in need of an upgrade to take advantage of today’s advanced devices. This is not that upgrade. Sure you get a bigger canvas (still tiny in comparison to other apps) and a few of the tools have an extra slider or two, but there is only one new tool (a cloner I have no use for), the ability to increase the brush size to 500 (although you have to type this in yourself, no convenient slider here) and that’s about it. An absolute and utter disappointment. They haven’t even bothered to implement the by now practically industry standard two tap undo. It’s just the same old clunky app complete with antiquated interface and gallery. I think it’s scandalous the developer chose to release this as a separate app at full cost and I don’t think I’ll buy from them again. There are several other, much more advanced, “traditional” painting apps out there that are worth your money. Oh and I know it’s “new”, but it’s buggy, really, really buggy, especially when you increase the brush sizes above 100%. All in all a poor show....

I don’t know why but suddenly the thumbnails all turned generic the the ArtRage logo. I have dozens of artwork and I now have to spend time opening each one to find it.

It would be nice to have an option to SEE the brush cursor/shape BEFORE I make a stroke. Like most digital painting software.

Big thanks to the developers of this art software. With Procreate’s lack of realistic color blending I gave up on using the iPad for art. Upon buying ArtRage Vitae and seeing it immediately mix blue and yellow to create a beautiful green color I am realizing there is hope for the future of art on the iPad. The sad grey mush you get when mixing blue and yellow in inferior art programs makes ArtRage Vitae a must-buy. Just hold your finger down on the color in the lower right to access the Real Color Blending. My Bob Ross dream is coming true.

ArtRage has always been a go-to for realistic digital painting especially for those who like a UI that’s familiar to fine artists, with a tray of brushes and media tools instead of a Photoshop-like interface. I’ve used AR for years but when I saw this new version I thought finally they updated this app which has never really changed in over a decade. Nope…still the same. It looks and behaves exactly like the original app. So what’s “Vitae” about it? Head scratcher. Still good and worth using but wonder why it exists unless purely to dupe original users into buying. Guilty!