For the last 15 years, I practically used the same tools:
In the 90’s and 00’s, the Illustrator + Photoshop was a fearsome duo that almost 80% of the designers used.
Some of them used Corel Draw and Macromedia Freehand instead. The latter was acquired by Adobe as a strategical decision and discontinued.
With the technological breakthroughs, the evolution of the internet and the increasing speed of mobile networks, the need for web design and mobile applications emerged.
This caused the emergence of tools tailored specifically for this area.
Adobe Photoshop continues to be the perfect tool for image editing , but the Adobe Illustrator went to a 2nd level, with the works in the area being more aligned with the web/Apps.
My current tools
Draw.io
Basic diagram application that utilizes a large amount of equally basic images to create your project.
Draw.io is browser-based, any computer with access to the Internet can use the application.
We can define what kind of diagram to do, choosing from a wide array template shapes (Business, Charts, Flowcharts, Mockups, Software Design, Wireframes…).
It’s absolutely free to use as a standalone diagram method.
Balsamiq Mockups
Rapid wireframing tool that helps you Work Faster & Smarter. It reproduces the experience of sketching on a whiteboard, but using a computer.
We can quickly build a first prototype to show and discuss with the client. This way, the main focus is on ideas rather than design.
The single user License can be purchased for a one time payment of $89.
Sketch
Sketch is the perfect tool to design interfaces, websites, icons, apps and everything else you can imagine. It’s only available to Mac users and has the main features we find in Illustrator.
One of its strengths is the ability to integrate with other platforms through plugins, like Invision, Zeplin, Flinto, etc.
Its annual costs are quite low / reasonable when compared to Adobe products. The advantage is the license includes free updates for 12 months after the date of purchase. Once that year is up, you can continue to use Sketch on that version for as long as you want, or you can renew your license to continue receiving the latest updates for the following year.
Invision
It is a tool that can be used to introduce the product to the clients and allows them to give feedback and comment directly on the prototype.
It can simulate the navigation of a product, adding animations, gestures, and transitions to transform your static screens into clickable, interactive prototypes.
The Inspect from Invision gives you access to CSS and to the assets of the screens. Developers are thankful for it.
As it is such a complete tool, it has replaced Zeplin from work kit.
You have all actions concentrated in one place and you avoid paying a subscription.
2016 was a great year for Design tools, with new tools being released and previously existing tools being improved with new features. To list some of the more notable ones, there were: Figma , Adobe XD, Stage & Gallery, Framer, Protopie and Principle.
Technological tools are constantly evolving. What we use today, may no longer exist tomorrow.
Innovation and Adaptation are the keys to your Success.
As Designers we need to be open to try new tools to help us and facilitate the development of our work.
Do you have any comments or feedback on this subject? We’d love to hear from you!
At Runtime Revolution we care about the user experience. We are a team of designers and developers willing to make your ideas a success.
This post was originally published at http://revs.runtime-revolution.com