Trying out ecto.

I don’t know why I even bother, actually. It’s not as if the world could use more ways for me to inflict my words upon it. Heaven knows I’ve done enough damage! Here, have a pretty picture instead:

This “lily” is one of a series of doodles in a Muji binder notebook. The ink is Caran d’Ache Grand Canyon, and the pen is a Mabie Todd Swan from the late 1800s, with an overfeed. It has one of the best nibs I own – expressive, flexible, delicate yet resilient. There’s a lot of waiting during shoots, and doodling is better than idling.

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Skitch!

Uploaded with Skitch!

I love Skitch. It’s from plasq, the same crew who came up with Comic Life (now out for Windows). Both applications make creativity accessible and spontaneous. Skitch has replaced Word, Textedit and Photoshop as a quick think tool for me. I skitch storyboards, layouts, concept boards, ideas.

Features worth pointing out:

The “re-snap” feature that turns the entire Skitch window into a screengrabber. My favorite use for the feature is going full-size on a selected image within iPhoto, then making sure the Skitch window is on top of that when I re-snap. Instant background for a skitch! I used that technique in the fake storyboard linked above.

“Drag me” is a tiny icon that appears as a tab on the bottom of the Skitch window. I can drag skitches out at different stages: for example, one narrative with three endings.

“Photos” is a button on the upper left. When clicked, it makes the Skitch window flip to reveal iPhoto’s contents. Click a photo and the window flips back to front, with the photo ready to be used as a background for a Skitch.

mySkitch is a skitch-store-and-share site. There’s a button on the lower right of the Skitch window that says “Webpost.” I can choose to publish skitches to mySkitch or .mac.

Yes, a graphics tablet will make using Skitch a lot more fun, although I know a couple of art directors with a death grip on their mice.

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