Tools of the Trade

What's up?

*redacted*

A section where I talk about what's new follow on twitter or subscribe to the newsletter for this.

Once you define a problem; usually solutions and ideas are a dime a dozen. The challenge is not the brightest idea in the room.

The challenge usually becomes these layers:

• Privatisation, Economics of the Idea
• Plausibility
• Risk Assessment
• Measurability
• Taste & Control
• and more

Successful products bridge the gap between all these layers. They make it easy to create art or solve problems. Some examples:

Apple Pencil + iPad Pro + Procreate for Art

From YouTube, Instagram to Dribble and Behance — the combo of these two tools have become the tool of choice for many professional graphic designers, illustrators, artists, comic creators and others.

Check out Gal Shir's work. Gal and many artists like him been at it since over a decade. With these tools — I see them doing it more work at scale.

Some key ways it bridges the gap:

• No more frustration of supplies running out at the last moment
• Always available
• Mobile
• The existing skill of gesture control and taste still works with very minute adjustments

TikTok & Snapchat for Creative Videos

It's easy to think of a funny situation, but what if you could enact it?

What used to take knowledge of Adobe After Effects and years of training is now a filter away. From re-enacting your favourite scene for an Indian soap opera to creating video memes have never been this easy.

Check out this crazy creative guy and yours truly.

No-Code apps for Automation & Building Functionality

With apps like Airtable, Webflow, Notion, and more — creating a mini-app, a close to a functional prototype, trying to the basic tech for a startup idea has become 100x easier.

Imagine a generation that grows up with these tools.

Some key ways they bridge the gap:

• Tools to create tools — mould it to suit your needs
• Understanding of nuances
• Building a community around for evangelism and support
• Focus on removing mundane patterns across workflows

Twitter for Conversations

While posts with words are ubiquitous on all platforms — but by making them the central theme and disposable has changed the way we have conversations.

While this has happened, both, in a healthy and unhealthy direction; for me twitter has amplified serendipity more than anything else ❤️

Figma for visual communication

It wrapped the shop of an entire stack (Sketch > Animation Tool > Hand-off Tool) within a short period.

From prototypes, animated presentations, illustrations, etc. you can do a lot more in Figma than you could with many tools combined.

What's your favourite product or example? How does the product you're working on helps bridge this gap?

You are reading a post that I wrote a long time back—at least 4 years ago. Take it with a bag of salt.