Annotator 5000

← Back to Kevin's homepagePublished: 2019 October 28Last updated: 2020 Feb 28

The Annotator 5000 is a MacOS app that lets you draw on your screen using a mouse or drawing tablet:

Download pre-release trial.

Note that the current pre-release builds expire 30 days after they were built, to keep you coming back here to test newer builds =P

Controls

Start/stop drawing: Option-tilde. (Global hotkey, press it whenever.)

Stop drawing: Escape

Change colors: Left/Right arrow keys

Change transparency: Up/Down arrow keys

Change size: scroll (mouse / touchpad) or press harder (tablet stylus)

Erase: hold spacebar while drawing

Clear canvas: Backspace or right click

Take a screenshot: Command-Shift-3 (full screen) Command-Shift-4 (select area to save)

TODO before actual release

• Optimize rendering for battery life
• Smoothly interpolate between points when drawing very quickly
• Draw with a circle rather than quad
• Pricing, free-trial, and payment system (likely similar to Finda)
• Apple code signing and notorization

TODO after initial release

• Multi-monitor support (currently only works on primary monitor)
• Undo/redo (likely on a segment basis)
• Pick colors directly from the screen
• (Maybe) use iPad or iPhone as drawing tablet

Won’t do

• Export drawings (instead, use MacOS screenshot functionality: Command-Shift-4)
• Text
• Live multi-player collaboration

Changelog

Version 55

• Extended trial to 90 days since a few folks asked to try it out = )

Version 54

• Remove pen-tilt-to-erase (kept triggering accidentally)

Version 52

• Add opacity adjustment
• Fix drawing glitch where sometimes cursor would remain visible outside of drawing

Version 47

• Initial test release