It was the fall semester in 2004. One of my classmates asked if I wanted his old drawing tablet, since he had just gotten a new one. I would have been a fool to say no, so the following class he brought in his sky blue Wacom drawing tablet, and gave it to me. I went home, plugged in the USB cable, opened up Photoshop, and drew this.
I’d messed around with drawing tablets before, but this was the most involved drawing I’d ever done with one up to that point. I knew it was going to change my art, since all of my digital drawing had been done with a mouse up to that point.
The next week, I thanked my classmate (whose name now escapes me, over a decade-and-a-half later), and told him that I couldn’t just accept the tablet for free. But I didn’t have a ton of money, so I gave him the $40 I could afford at that point. He was surprised and thanked me, after double-checking.
The tablet eventually died out several years later. But if not for the thoughtfulness of a guy I had one class with and talked to before and after class a few times, the above drawing of Slash would have never happened.