Essential Graphic Design Equipment

There’s a wide variety of essential graphic design equipment in our studio but we thought we’d highlight just a few items of hardware that we now use each and everyday, which have become essential equipment in our creative and production processes.

iPhone

There may be bigger smartphones on the market but the iPhone works perfectly for me. It compliments my other Apple hardware and runs many of the same apps that I use daily on my iPad and my Mac. The camera is superb and whilst the battery life isn’t great I seem to manage ok, with the help of several charging cables scattered about the place.

Jot Classic

The Jot Classic has a precision engineered quality to it and unlike many types of stylus it has a super accurate tip, not an awkward rubber nib. This makes it perfect for sketching, doodling and writing notes. For me, it’s the perfect tool to partner the amazing drawing and graphic design apps available on the iPad.

Moleskine Evernote Notebook

A paper notebook? Kind of. It’s no ordinary notebook as it allows me to combine analogue and digital, using a special scan system and smart stickers. The stickers can act like tags and once an analogue note or graphic design doodle has been scanned, or photographed with my iPhone or iPad, the note is digitised, uploaded to my Evernote library and is searchable.

“The Jot Classic has a precision engineered quality to it and unlike many types of stylus it has a super accurate tip.”

iPad Mini

The iPad is my ‘go to’ device for sketching ideas and designs, note taking in client meetings and for quickly researching ideas on the web. There are a wide range of apps available for these core activities but I prefer just a few tried and trusted ones.

Evernote is perfect for note taking and works really well on the iPad. In fact it works so well I’m writing this blog post using the app on my iPad Mini. Evernote has a companion app called Penultimate which allows me to make handwritten notes and thumbnail sketches which will sync back to my Evernote library. All my notes are then accessible on my iPad, iPhone, Mac and online via any web browser.

For sketching I use a couple of different apps, namely ‘Paper’ by FiftyThree and lately ‘Sketches’ by Tayasui. Both apps offer a range of pen and brush options but Sketches has an old skool pre-digital, pre-Mac graphic design toolbox feel to it which I really like.

MacBook Air

Not my daily driver, but an essential piece of equipment nonetheless. It’s incredibly powerful for its size, allowing me to run almost all of my professional graphic design apps, pre-press production software and website development tools. The battery lasts all day and it’s light enough and small enough to carry with me anywhere. The MacBook Air also works really well when hooked up to big screen TV’s and projectors, which makes it perfect for making presentations to clients.

Essential Graphic Design Equipment

There’s lots of other kit in our studio which we rely on day-to-day and in the coming months we’ll share with you some of those other neat and interesting tools.