Hello,

The best advice I can give you is to test before you buy.
A tablet is a "must-have" for  photo retouching but ... it depends the feelings you will have.
It asks some techniques and practising.

Some effects can't be achieve without a pressure sensitive tablet 'cause you have better control ( over transparency or brush size, useful for "layer masking" ).
And with a tablet, the Pen tool becomes magic ( especially with the control pads on intuos 3 series )

And I won't make advertising here but Wacom is offering the best quality and ergonomics.
I have an old Art Pad II ( still working ) and an Intuos 3 A4-Size. And perhaps I will go for the new Cintiq 12Wx to have the "direct paint on screen" feeling.

But again, try to test one or 2  models before buying ( A5 size is quite enough for photo retouching ,,,  )

Hope that will help you.

Aegy

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David "AEGIPAN" H. aka Aegy

AEGIPAN OFFICIAL WEBSITE - Glamour Photography At Its Best