Tools of the Trade: My Personal favorites

The other day I met up with some students from Northwest Nazarene University to talk all things design as they are gearing up for graduation in a couple months. We discussed everything from freelancing, to taxes, and everything in between. Of course, we ended up discussing the tools of the trade, and that got me thinking about what supples I use on a daily basis that help me do my job.

FIELD NOTES // Dot-Graph Memo Books

In this day and age, every usually has three things with them when they head out the door: wallet, phone, keys. Let me tell you though, this is my fourth every day carry item. Need a grocery list? Done. Have the next million dollar idea? Better write that down. Or, if you’re like me, logo concepts and doodles.

The dot-graph style is super handy as well for quick layout sketches when prototyping websites, keeping things organized, and giving you some flexibility that you won’t find with traditional lined paper.

PIGMA MICRON PENS

I have used a lot of pens, but these take the cake. Consistent line quality, fast drying, archival grade ink, a variety of tip sizes, long lasting, and just plain cool. I can honestly say that I use these more often than a pencil. Partially because I like the permanence of pen, but also because it slows me down enough to be very intentional with my marks.

SONY WI-C310 WIRELESS IN-EAR HEADPHONES

For a long time I just used whatever headphones I could get my hands on, because music is a driving force behind my ability to focus and design effectively. Last year I logged over 80,000 minutes listening to Spotify alone. During those minutes, I realized a few things:

1. I don’t like wires
   Before these, I constantly had wired headphones plugged into my computer, which unfortunately rested directly on top of my mouse hand. Talk about obnoxious.

2. I needed something with a lot of battery life
   most of the top competitors and even many of the “budget brands” had battery life that was less than eight hours. Here’s the thing, I am at my desk at least eight hours a day, and if I lose my music connection, I will not be anywhere near as effective as I need to be. That’s why I was pleasantly surprised with these: up to fifteen hours of battery life on a single charge. I push that pretty frequently, usually squeaking out two work days on a single charge.

3. They needed to be hard to misplace
   Simply put, many of my coworkers have true wireless ear pods, and they constantly place them on the desk or in their pocket and lose them. Even those these have a wire between the two buds, it means that I can hang them from my neck when not in use. Easy to find, and hard to misplace.

GRAMMARLY

I know I touched on this with my last blog post, but seriously, Grammarly saves my bacon over and over again. From typing up contracts, proposals, and e-mails, to proofreading romance copy on products, this makes me look like the pro that I am.