A Designer’s Workspace ∞
Posted at 8:40 PM on April 7th, 2009
A workspace for a designer is a very important thing. It’s where all the magic happens. From drawing inspiration from beautiful works of digital art to pushing colorful pixels in Photoshop, this is where a designer makes their visions come to life. In my opinion, a designer’s success all starts with the perfect monitor.
For a long while, the best monitor I had was the one attached to my 17″ Dell Inspiron, which was a pretty decent machine for the work I was doing on it. However, that screen started fading on the left-hand side and I was left with half-a-screen. That wasn’t a great work environment for me. Beyond that, I had my desktop in the office, which I really disliked using because it’s so far from all the action in the living room.
From family to the television, access to food/the kitchen, and even my luscious Polk bookshelf speakers, the living room is where I’ve been doing the bulk of my design work. Now that my laptop is literally “fading away,” I needed a reason to start working in my office again. However, my desktop was hooked up to a 21″ CRT beast of a monitor (which weighed in at a beastly 58 lbs.). In addition, it was extremely blurry, had poor contrast, and sat a bit too far away from me so I was always leaning forward to read the screen. Something had to be done about this situation.
Enter the SAMSUNG 2343BWX High Glossy Black 23″ Widescreen LCD monitor. Coming with an optimal resolution of 2048×1152 and a contrast ration of 20,000:1, this is the single most amazing monitor I’ve ever actually seen in person. The colors are the brightest I’ve ever seen and I actually have to squint when the screen is all white.
Without further ado, here are some shots I took of the new setup (and yes, I’m on a PC, for all you loyal mac fanboys). Last time I checked, it uses a monitor, keyboard and mouse, same as your mac.
16 comments so far
Oops. I dribbbled.
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I designed this for a big announcement on the UpThemes blog.
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Working on revisions to a logo we were commissioned to design.
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Client requested some color changes.
Steal this design. See if I care.
Hand-crafted in the year of the tiger.
Your digs remind me of my current — though, I’m one of those Mac fanboys you spoke on. Keep up the good fight in your abode, my friend!
HAHA,
You use windows.
That monitor looks like it’s illuminating the whole room! I think I might pick up one for my birthday. They seem to have suddenly dropped in price. The importance of a good monitor can’t be overstated. I notice a load of difference between my office setup and my home office one. I’m a PC fanboy!
@Jordan Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I don’t really like the workspace in the pictures. I don’t think I’d do well on such a small desk.
The desk isn’t actually small, it’s quite large. I actually have to disassemble it to move it out of the room. I think the size of the monitor is making the desk look small.
Wow, that thing is bright. It makes me want a new monitor. I have had a 20″ Dell LCD for the last 5 years that just refuses to die.
@Matt My advice: Kill it. Buy the Samsung 23″. It’s amazing. ‘Nuff said.
Oh, and get back to work!
Creepy… we have the exact same monitor and colored desk. Just got my PC parts today so I’m putting together my computer. I’m taking a lot of pictures, I also got a new/better computer desk that’s darker.
Newegg was out of stock of that Samsung monitor, I was going to go Dual-screen and I know there’s like a million other monitors out there, I’m OCD like that and need identical computers.
@Jacob Gube Are you serious? You know what they say about great minds…
I can only forgive your PC use because your using a Mac-like skin.
Nice monitor, wish I had the 23″, the stand looks more sturdy then my 22″ for Samsung.
What are the two trophies on your desk symbols of? What events did you champion? (sorry, off topic, but curious….)
Those were from design challenges at one of my previous jobs. One is a designer of the month award voted on by our team (9 people) and the other was a designer of the month award for our entire department (about 40 or so people) voted on by the management team.
Not exactly Webbies but still something I am proud of.
Very, very cool. Congrats, and thanks for the info, Chris. Kind regards,
Rod
Investing in the relevant equipment is definitely key to working efficiently and effectively. I agree a decent monitor is one of the most important items especially when it comes to design. Creating an environment that is comfortable and inspiring is also going to help when it comes to getting creative.
My homepage keep getting hundreds of crap posts.