Pros and Cons in design tools
I’ve never been a fanboy to one specific design tool. I just use whatever it needs. Until a couple of my friends repeatedly ask me what design tool I use to design UI. And I was like, “bruh, please!”.
In this UI design world, Sketch is the best fit, for now. Though Photoshop indeed for cross platform.
Yet to be honest, I couldn’t revoke that there are number of design tools in industrial standard. People vote them, up till they are enhanced in the first line of “the most frequently used tools”. That’s the people power. They’re like a community. So the bigger the community utilize it, the easier you might get support for your problem.
Before I join to uxmarker and move to mac, I was a freelance designer. I used plenty tools to accomplish my work. I jumped from one tool to another effortlessly in one day based on the needs. Basically i was the avatar. I was pretty joyous with that, even i faced points like …
Fed up when i delivered master project file to client.
People might say, “There is a photoshop, bruh”. Me was like, “Oh for the sake of science i know Photoshop is messiah, but the problem ain’t it. It’s the bloody size of the final master file. It’s colossal. How can i deliver a gigantic size file project to client when the internet connection is sucks?!
So i started to looking for alternative.
I pivoted.
Windows and Linux platform were seemed to be limited at that time. Yet i couldn’t cave in. Those restrain brought me to be more innovative. I browsed. I found new ways and brightly explored them.
I found these. I recap based on my experience with them:
1. Photoshop (Ps)
Who doesn’t know this humdrum Ps? It’s a regular basic tool. Yet very powerful. Photoshop capable to design everything. In the right person, this weapon can joggle the world. The flexibility is off the chart. But it’s like a double edged sword. It ought to brutal you sometimes, the final master file size.
2. Illustrator (Ai)
Yeah it’s in one family with Ps. But the final product is in vector based. Although this tools isn’t designed specifically for UI, but it works cool if you able how to curate it.
3. Figma
I begin to use Figma when my PC broken. I use an old laptop that can only run smoothly on linux. I find this tool was a complete package. It has basic feature for executing UI design needs. This tool is cloud based. So we can use it on any platform as long as we have stable internet connection. And ironically, internet connection sometimes can be a real problem in my country. I damn love this tool if you are in the high-speed internet area.
4. Sketch
I’ll try to be objective. I’m not gonna rate this tools highly just because it’s my main tool now. But, it is. It’s easy to use, light, and more importantly, it’s an industry standard for UI design presently. The size of final master file still make sense. I don’t need highly internet connection to deliver the final file like other tools, and it can easily integrated to another tools to support the developer. The lack of this tool is only available for Mac platform. So we need to spend extra money to catch an Apple to try this. Sketch is cool.
5. Gravit Designer
It’s a new player here. I haven’t explore it much. All i know it’s a discount edition of Sketch if i could say. Basically it’s same as Sketch but it has limit on creating artboard in one page. It only can handle one artboard for each page.
Yeah that’s it. Those five are the tools that i’ve been using. You’ve got an idea?
Anyway, choosing tool is different with choosing job. Choosing job is like choosing a wife. You have to be passionate about it, love it with all your heart and soul so you could accomplish something extraordinary.
On the other hand, choosing tools is like choosing a girlfriend (Ha!). It could shift depend on situation and condition. So choose it wisely ;)
Oh almost forgot. One of my mentor told me:
A fool person with a tool, is still a fool. But a tool with a smart person, can be a powerful weapon.
What i’m trying to say is, no matter what tool do you use, it depends on you how to use it. A Ferrari should be driven as a Ferrari. You don’t drive a Ferrari as an Espass, do you?
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