If I’m drawing or animating digitally for an extended period of time, generally my wrist starts to hurt because the barrel of the Intuos pen is so thick. I’m not sure how common this trick is, but it’s worth sharing because it might spare you a pain in the wrist.

This goes for all pens from Intuos 2 on up to Intuos 4– I believe the Cintiq pens are about identical to the I3’s/I4’s.

1. Unscrew the tapered tip, right below the gel grip.
2. Pop off the clicky button by gently lifting the edge of one side; the whole button should pop off.
3. Slide off the grip.
4. (Optional)– pop the button back in (seen here). It will stick out, but you can keep it out of your way depending on how you hold the pen.

Now the pen’s barrel is roughly the same thickness of an ordinary pen. Huzzah!