Last week I shared my current hardware set-up. This week, as promised, I’m listing the software I use as part of my regular workflow. Some of the tools are specific to my craft, while others fall into the category of “can’t-live-without” productivity apps.
Creative
Adobe Photoshop CS4: my de-facto go-to tool. Photoshop touches practically every angle of my workflow, whether it be graphics for the web, illustration, or comics.
Corel Painter X: Admittedly I use Painter primarily for inking. Its coveted Scratchboard tool gives me the line variation I need.
Autodesk Sketchbook Pro: New to my arsenal – but has quickly found its way to my must-have list. Sketching with this program rivals drawing on paper for me.
Productivity
Launchbar: super fast application launcher (and much, much more)
MarsEdit: A must-have for composing and editing blogposts. Highly customizable and easy to use. This powerful blogging tool is essential, especially if you manage multiple WordPress sites.
Divvy: lets you quickly and accurately position application and Finder windows exactly where you want to on your screen.
Blast: this program lives in my menubar and makes it a snap to quickly grab recent files I’ve been working on, regardless of their location on my hard drive. No more tunneling down into Finder windows to get what I’m after.
Typinator: keyboard macros make writing boilerplate text a breeze.
Default Folder: Imagine setting a specific application to always point to a specific folder. The time saved by this application alone is enormous.
Pages: Fast and elegant word processing without all the bloat of MS Word.
Web
Flickr Uploadr: This one has some quirks, but until I can find a better tool that lets me upload my photos to Flickr, I’m stuck with it.
Google Chrome: Fast browser that lets me synch bookmarks across all my machines.
Dropbox: 2GB of free space you can use to share files between machines. A browser interface lets you grab your files anywhere you have an Internet connection.
Transmit: FTP wasn’t sexy until this application came along. I’ve used this program since 1996.
SpamSieve: A terrific program that sorts junk mail from good mail. It learns quickly, and reduced my junk mail by several orders of magnitude.
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