Featured ScrnShots’ User: Ryan Townsend May 28th
Greg and I have decided to interview a ScrnShots user once a week or so. We will be selecting featured users according to number of uploads, comments and celebrity status. If you are interested in being featured, upload tons of screenshots and comment on others screenshots… trust me, we will notice you.
Some other ways you might go about being featured, is by blogging about ScrnShots, telling us how awesome we are or hassling us on twitter.
Our first featured ScrnShots user is Ryan Townsend. Ryan has been uploading, commenting, and giving great feedback since launch. I had the pleasure of talking to Ryan last week about what he does, and how ScrnShots is changing the way he works.
Derek: What is your profession?
Ryan: I am a part-time Lead Web Designer / Developer at a small ICT company in the Midlands, UK, and a full-time student studying Internet Computing at Manchester University, UK - as you can imagine time management is rather complicated! I have been developing websites professionally for 5 years now and in the past year I have moved on to web applications.
Derek: What does a day at work look like for you?
Ryan: Well as everyone knows, students cannot physically wake up until at least 11am, however I only have this luxury during term when I work remotely, work at the office starts at 9. Either way, first port of call is my RSS feeds, podcasts and emails, to see what is happening in the world. Next I set about my usual routine of working on layouts for website projects we have, and switching to coding web applications when I am less inspired. I believe the balance between artist design and technical development keeps me enthusiastic and driven. I make sure I have at least five minutes away from the computer an hour, so during that time I often plan things on my whiteboard, which I reckon is one of the most important tools for any developer (and you can pick one up for around £20 these days - bargain).
Derek: What are some things that you are working on right now?
Ryan: I have numerous web applications in the works at the moment, most of which I cannot release details for, but keep an eye on my Scrnshots feed (scrnshots.com/users/ryan) for sneak-peaks. For those of you interested in Ruby On Rails development I am also running a screencast tutorial site over at ThinkRefresh.com.
Derek: How does ScrnShots fit into your workflow?
Ryan: Well as I mentioned earlier, the first thing I do in the morning is check my RSS feeds, which used to be full of web design galleries, I’d look through all the new entries screenshot-ing the sites I like and sort them into folders based on the site’s style. This process has now been totally replaced by getting my inspiration from select user’s RSS feeds on Scrnshots, and either favorite-ing their uploads, or visiting the site personally and capturing the area I like using the desktop tool (currently in beta). The tagging really helps, as OS X doesn’t let you tag your documents (to my knowledge), so Scrnshots is much more organized when it comes to revisiting the images.
Derek: What do you use ScrnShots for?
Ryan: Besides storing my own personal inspiration, many of my friends also follow my feed for aiding their own projects. I release sneak-peaks of my applications, so people can provide me with valuable feedback, I also enjoy reciprocating and providing advice to other users too.
Derek: This is your time to shine, what else would you like to say?
Ryan: To be the best you can as a designer / developer, you must constantly look at what others are doing to stay in the game, otherwise you’ll quickly be left behind. You should also be critical of your own work, so getting feedback from others can be really useful. Scrnshots is a brilliant place for both of these things, so get signed up.