Here at Looka, it’s our mission to make design delightful and accessible for everyone \u2014 and we want you to meet the people working hard behind the scenes to make that happen.<\/p>\n
In this post, our talented team of designers, developers, and data scientists share the tools they love most and where they go for inspiration.\u00a0(p.s. Our team is growing fast, so not everyone is included here!)<\/p>\n
\u201cSketch<\/strong> is the perfect tool for creating a UI — it\u2019s easy to use, has lots of great plugins, and really speeds up my workflow.<\/p>\n InVision<\/strong><\/a> is a great tool for collaborating and getting feedback.\u00a0You can create clickable prototypes without having to write code. It\u2019s a simple way to get a proof of concept and integrates well with Sketch.<\/p>\n For all my vector work, I use\u00a0Illustrator<\/a><\/strong> — I believe it\u2019s the most robust vector drawing application. And when I\u2019m working on micro-interactions and animations, Principle<\/strong><\/a> is super easy to use, integrates with Sketch, and allows me to work quickly.<\/p>\n I go to Dribbble<\/strong><\/a>, Behance<\/strong><\/a>, and Screenlane<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0for inspiration. I always look forward to posts by DKNG<\/strong><\/a> and Jay Fletcher<\/a><\/strong>.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m pretty big into not having to touch my mouse so I have all kinds of custom keyboard shortcuts configured on my computer. Most notably I use a program called Spectacle<\/strong><\/a> that lets you easily record keyboard shortcuts that resize and align multiple windows precisely. I\u2019ve installed it on every computer I\u2019ve touched in the past year because I can\u2019t live without it. Honourable mention goes to prettier<\/strong><\/a>, which autoformats your code on save.<\/p>\n I subscribe to \u2014 and genuinely look forward to \u2014\u00a0Val Head\u2019s UI Animation newsletter<\/strong><\/a>. It\u2019s a weekly roundup of rad codepens, beautifully considered sites, and relevant articles. 13\/10 would recommend.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cInsomnia<\/strong><\/a> is an open source HTTP and GraphQL client. I use it daily to test our Golang REST endpoints and GraphQL mutations\/queries.<\/p>\n Template tags are probably my favourite feature of Insomnia. They can hook into the request and response lifecycle, allowing you to chain requests together. I actually created my own custom template tag plugin, which applies a special transformation to one of our requests so that I don’t have to do any extra manual labour!<\/p>\n I also love Bash scripts and aliases. When I realize that I run a certain command a lot, it immediately becomes an alias. For more complex tasks, I usually add them as scripts to a little Bash CLI of mine. Some commands I have include database backup and restoration, cache flushing, VS Code<\/strong> settings backup, and service management. Basically, if a manual task can be abstracted away or automated, I will make it so!<\/p>\n Lastly, I use Docker<\/strong><\/a> a lot. I have a bunch of Docker-related aliases, and many of my Bash scripts rely on Docker as well. It’s great for running things locally without the hassle of installing, configuring, and managing runtime environments. Being able to describe your app in a readable format and having the confidence that it will run anywhere it’s deployed is very empowering.<\/p>\n For inspiration, I like Indie Hackers<\/strong><\/a> \u2014 it\u2019s a great place to read about the accomplishments and failures of startups and entrepreneurs. I also check out the newly launched products every few days on Product Hunt<\/strong><\/a>.”<\/p>\n “I love\u00a0Pikka – Color Picker<\/strong><\/a> because I can quickly get the color code for any color on my screen with one simple keyboard shortcut. Every color I source gets put into my color library; this makes it very easy for me to create color libraries for individual design projects.<\/p>\n I also love\u00a0BetterSnapTool<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0because you can quickly snap your windows to full size, half the screen, or even quarters of the screen. I love maximizing my window space, and this tool allows me to do that quickly with little to no effort —\u00a0I definitely recommend it, especially if you find yourself always resizing your windows for a better workflow.<\/p>\n For inspiration, I go to Instagram and Pinterest.\u00a0Both of these platforms have many great ideas and inspiration, not just for designers but all creatives.<\/p>\n A recent piece of work I saw on Instagram was the American Express rebrand by Pentagram<\/strong><\/a>. This piece got me really excited because the rebrand was done so well. There were only minor tweaks done to the logo, but these minor tweaks made a huge difference. That’s what I think design is all about \u2014 the little things.”<\/p>\n \u201cI use Python<\/strong> for most data analysis and machine learning, but I\u2019ve used other languages like Julia<\/strong> and R<\/strong> for specialized tasks. I like the text editor\u00a0Vim<\/strong><\/a>, though I\u2019ve recently made the switch to VS Code<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n I use\u00a0TensorFlow<\/strong><\/a> a ton —\u00a0it\u2019s a library for machine learning and specifically for building neural networks.\u00a0Keras<\/strong><\/a>, which sits on top of TensorFlow, is great for prototyping and testing out ideas. Then there are all sorts of amazing Python libraries that come up all the time, like Numpy<\/strong>, Scikit-learn<\/strong>, and Pandas<\/strong>.<\/p>\n For machine learning research, I go to\u00a0Google Scholar<\/strong><\/a> and search topic-wise or go through a recent paper\u2019s citation list, which is a super nerdy way to look up new stuff. With machine learning, the research cycle is so short — someone gets something new working, and they publish it right away, make a demo, and put it on Github<\/strong>. It\u2019s an interactive and exciting release process where you can see the field advance almost weekly.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI run on elementary OS<\/strong>, which is a Linux distribution, and I do most of my coding in VS Code<\/strong>. I used to work with Atom<\/strong>, but I found that performance-wise and with the extensions available, VS Code helps me work faster and better. For graphics work, I use Inkscape<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n Otherwise, for tools, it\u2019s pretty limited — as a front-end developer, it\u2019s a lot of command-line tools and not too much else.<\/p>\n For inspiration, I follow Hacker News<\/strong><\/a> regularly — it\u2019s a project by Y Combinator, so there\u2019s always a lot of interesting stuff posted there. On Reddit, the web dev and JavaScript communities are pretty active. I follow a lot of people on Twitter — npm<\/strong><\/a> has a really cool development team, and they\u2019re always doing interesting stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cTrello<\/strong><\/a> is my go-to for personal project management. I say personal because as a team, we use Asana<\/strong><\/a>, but I find Trello useful for keeping small tasks on track. It helps me visualize where things are and what needs to be done.<\/p>\n Sketch<\/strong><\/a> is great for designing layouts for screens of all sizes. I like the interface, and there are a ton of third-party plugins for just about anything you need. As someone who used Adobe products strictly for over 13 years, I was skeptical at first, but I found switching pretty easy.<\/p>\n The price made it appealing, and being able to have multiple artboards at different sizes without it completely crashing was a plus. It\u2019s a great mix of Photoshop and Illustrator, raster and vector. They changed the game a few years back, and Adobe is only starting to catch up.<\/p>\n I use Illustrator<\/strong> for creating icons or more complex vector graphics. And, of course, anything needed for print. Illustrator still rules at creating amazing vectors, and I feel like I can make anything with it.<\/p>\n I use a Chrome extension called Muzli<\/strong><\/a> that provides some pretty great overall inspiration. If I\u2019m looking for something specific, I\u2019ll head over to Dribbble<\/strong>, UpLabs<\/strong>, or UI Movement<\/strong>.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI used Python<\/strong> because it has very good data analytics and machine learning libraries. For coding, I usually use Stack Overflow<\/strong><\/a> and GitHub<\/strong><\/a> for debugging code.<\/p>\n For learning about machine algorithms, I end up Googling a lot and reading articles on Medium, or arXiv<\/strong><\/a> papers for more advanced subjects. Some YouTube tutorials are great, too \u2014 Andrew Ng<\/strong>, who\u2019s also a co-founder of Coursera, has good videos about machine learning. For my more basic coding needs, like Python, I really like the Sentdex<\/strong><\/a> channel.”<\/p>\n \u201cI love VS Code<\/strong> and Slack<\/strong><\/a>. Both tools have a sleek design, are super user-friendly, and have come to replace chunkier tools that were pretty common in my toolkit (Sublime Text and Skype\/any other instant messenger).<\/p>\n I also love Unsplash<\/strong><\/a> for general aesthetic inspiration and photography (and a good land- or cityscape photo to start of my morning). For code-related inspiration, I follow a lot of developers on Twitter, listen to the Syntax FM<\/strong><\/a> podcast, and subscribe to the\u00a0CodePen<\/strong><\/a> newsletter.\u201d<\/p>\n “My absolute favourite tools are Illustrator<\/strong><\/a><\/span>\u00a0and <\/span>Photoshop<\/b><\/a>. Illustrator is perfect for creating graphics and making precise lines. Since the tool uses vectors, you can scale your art to any size for all sorts of formats! It\u2019s a great tool to create a clean and final product. It’s also easy to use for sketching and getting ideas down on multiple artboards. <\/span><\/p>\n Photoshop<\/b> allows for more organic art with its various paint brushes. It might not be the best for graphic illustrations, icon design, or typography, but it\u2019s great to use for photography and computer painting with the ability to add textures and layers. Sometimes I\u2019ll combine the two tools to create clean graphics that also have depth and textures.<\/span><\/p>\n One of my favourite sites for ideas and inspiration is <\/span>Dribbble<\/b><\/a>. I have a Google Chrome extension called <\/span>Panda<\/b><\/a> that automatically shows a feed of designers\u2019 work on Dribbble.\u00a0<\/span>I love that the first thing I see when I open my browser is a collection of really great work and tons of inspiration. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nLauren Greenway, Developer<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\nJake Deichert, Developer<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\nKaejon Misuraca, Designer<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\nAndrew Martin, Lead Data Scientist<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\nCameron Monagle, Developer<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\nMike Bell, Developer<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\nMahsa Rahimi, Data Scientist<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\nHeather Pierce, Developer<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\nYsabel Enverga, Designer<\/strong><\/h3>\n