How are trackballs for photo editing?

[funkmon]

Hey guys. I use a normal mouse and always have, but I see these creative people using trackballs all the time, primarily for video and audio editing. What about for photo editing? Is it as easy as a normal mouse? Does anything work better? Anything worse?

I ask because I'm about to pull the trigger on a 122 key Unicomp and I want to see if I can keep some desk space.

[switchnollie]

I'm sure if you get used to it, it's fine.
If you don't know how to use it then it won't be easy, more of a thing you'll have to try yourself.
I actually know of more people that use a pen/tablet for editing rather than a trackball.

I used a trackball for years but switched to a regular mouse since I'd end up playing FPS n such and it just didn't feel as precise.

Then there's the type of editing, I just slider sliders and adjust curves for the most part when I edit photos so for me anything is fine as long as it can move the sliders up by small increments which is why I mainly use a Logitech G mouse for it now.

[Leslieann]

CAD and Audio often use straight lines, but those are assisted, you mostly need per pixel precision when clicking, but dragging itself matters very little. How you setup your pointer matters the most on this. A Trackball is great since it's very stable while a mouse is a bit less stable, especially when trying to maintain a position.

While trackballs can be good for some photo editing and are fine for a majority of editing, they're terrible for some (software often comes to the rescue here).
Photo editing is usually lots of curves which isn't easy with a touchpad or mouse, at least with any precision. Tablets/pens work better, especially if you can look at what you are changing in real time right where you're hand is located. Try a tablet (no screen like Wacom Bamboo) and it's like you are playing a game and changed the difficulty from hard to medium, switch to a graphics tablet where you see what you are editing and it's like someone put it on easy.

Don't think you need to spend thousands on a drawing tablet, there are lost of PC based tablets you can buy used for CHEAP. My first one I bought was a Fujitsu with a bad sound system and missing bit of trim, cost me a little over $80. It wasn't a good computer but for doing drawing and photo editing and drawing on it was simply amazing. Some of the Lenovo X series tablets (not laptop) have the Wacom Penabled screen (some models, not all, check first) and can be had for just over $100 (Lenovo X220 tablet has a Wacom screen). These have less sensitivity than the professional drawing tablets Wacom offers but even professionals have a hard time being able to tell a difference.

[tp4tissue]

Also,   Colorimeter, you gotta have one.