When I first started interning as a designer (all of three years ago) I was shocked that the design office was a desk with a computer and a scanner. I’ll never forget my summer at an ad agency when I drove people nuts by showing up at concept meetings with piles of sketched ideas. I prefer working at home because I have my big drawing board right there, and even though you’ll never see anything drawn by hand in my work, I’ll be damned if I’m ever going to stop working with triangles, brushes, and Micron pens. And I get really confused that so many other young designers don’t want to work at a drawing board.

@ James...I think it's just a way of working. I agree that when you sit down, without the computer in front of you, and just think and let it "flow" it does come out quite quickly. That said, sometimes the idea is already in your head, and all you need is the told to complete it!

Anyways, on the side of sketches/pads/paper/pens..here's something to make you smile..

Ha! I still keep my old T square around for the same reason as Michael does.

Some of us are extremely lucky we have the backgrounds we do in the graphic arts. I remember computers (MACs) coming on the scene in NY in 1988. I had a type shop and was the second or third to have a MAC "research & development" area in the shop. I remember telling my customers (mostly book publishers - when they were still independently owned) that the computer was only one more tool - like a t-square and rubber cement were.

It became so much more than that. So many of us lost our incomes and lives (and not necessarily in that order). Funny how times change... Now everyone can be unemployed - LOL