Darby Thomas
Product designer (Patreon)
in designer
Who are you, and what do you do?
Hello, I'm a designer and illustrator in San Francisco. I spent three years making weird, fun stuff with Photojojo and Parabo Press. Now my day job is getting creators paid at Patreon. I'm increasingly getting more chill with calling myself a part-time political activist.
What hardware do you use?
The nerdiest thing about my digital setup is my Cherry MX keyboard with custom rainbow keycaps. I recently replaced my Bamboo tablet with Wacom's Intuos. Both those plug into my LG monitor.
What surprised me about activism is even in high-tech San Francisco an in-person conversation and a printed flyer is the best way to reach people. I hit the limit of what my Epson XP-640 inkjet printer could do and upgraded to the Canon MB2720 color laser printer and got the Canon PIXMA so I can do supertabloid prints. I picked up the cheapest 1" and 2.5" button makers you can get because omg people love pins! So if you're interested, you too can turn a corner of your junior one-bedroom apartment into a propaganda machine for about $500.
I'm a pretty frequent surfer and I have a 6'4" Modern Love Child surfboard. It's wide enough that I can teach my friends how to surf with it and short enough that I can stuff it into my hatchback.
And what software?
The switch from in-house designer to product designer was interesting. At Photojojo I'd be making goofy illustrations for pranks (like making a package smell like fresh baked cookies) in the morning, and then I'd be coding the frontend for a promotion in the afternoon. At Patreon I'm mostly in Sketch, Dropbox Paper, and Google Sheets.
Signal, Google Groups, and Google Drive are the apps that make organizing possible. I don't know how people did this stuff before.
What would be your dream setup?
This is pretty typical of someone in a city but more space. Right now I'm a few shelves and a desk away from feeling like I'm not drowning in stuff.
Uses This is supported by ZSA, makers of the Moonlander, ErgoDox EZ and Planck EZ keyboards. They also publish an awesome newsletter.