Overall, an incredible program and totally worth the cost. Even if you're not a comic book artist, this program is great for sketching and illustration.
My favorite features of the program are
The Inking tool - beautifully crisp and clean ink
Perspective tool - This tool has been an absolute godsend to someone (like me) who loathes eyeballing perspective for buildings/vehicles etc... It is super simple to set up and if the layer is on, will automatically lock all your strokes to the perspective lines.
Organization - The extra money is worth the comic book project organization. It saves all the pages individually and also in a containing project, so you can open the whole thing at once. I love being able to click from page to page without opening another file.
Comic panel automatic masking - makes laying out pages super fast and clean.
Automatic bleed lines - The program will set up bleed lines for you (you can customize it too) and will be consistent across all the pages.
My least favorite things
No Ctrl+Shift+C as far as I know - This is the WORST for me personally. I use this A LOT in Photoshop, and it kills me that there's not an easier way to copy all layers.
Weirdness with Wacom tablet - On occasion, something funky happens and the program will either read the Wacom pen in the wrong location or stop seeing it all together. The only way I've figured to fix this is with a restart...which can be really annoying when you're in the drawing zone. This doesn't happen often but it's something that's not ideal.
Very infrequent crashes - I wish this had a recovery system like Photoshop. I've only had one or two crashes in the 6 months I've used it. Save frequently.
Airbrush tool - The airbrush tool is not bad at all and will totally work for any artist, but it is inferior in my opinion to Photoshop. Still, nothing to snuff at.
Huge file sizes - this is pretty much a given with large projects.
Cross duplication - So far I haven't found a way to easily duplicate layers from one page to another.
Annoying groups - Photoshop definitely has EX5 beat on grouping layers. In Photoshop, if you select multiple layers and group them, they go in a folder automatically. With EX5, you have to manually move all the layers into a group, and some layers will not transfer their attributes correctly.
Manga Studio EX 5
4.3 | 147 ratings
Price:
Last update: 02-03-2025
About this item
Includes everything professional comic artists and aspiring artists need to create manga comic art
Easy to use, intuitive interface produces fast results and single-click special effects save time
Complete control over text, lines, word balloons, and page layout
Tons of screen tones included add dimension, depth, and character to your art
Built in special effects, tones and tools give artwork a unique style and professional look
Easy to use, intuitive interface produces fast results and single-click special effects save time
Complete control over text, lines, word balloons, and page layout
Tons of screen tones included add dimension, depth, and character to your art
Built in special effects, tones and tools give artwork a unique style and professional look
Top reviews from the United States
Amazon CustomerEssential program for comic artists
Sebastian ReidBest Art Program for the Price, for Life!
KeelyI really love this product
CHERIE HEDRICK