I actually prefer hand-drawn wireframes over digital tools for early stage design

Figma and Sketch are great for polish but I find my ideas flow way faster when I'm sketching on paper. Knocked out 30 layout variations in two hours last Monday that would have taken me twice as long in software. Anyone else skip the screen for the first round of brainstorming?

2 comments

2 Comments

thompson.xena2d ago

30 layouts in two hours? That's wild. Were those all quick rough sketches or were you actually getting into detail like button placement and flow arrows? I always wonder if people doing this fast are just throwing down boxes and lines or if they're really thinking through the user path as they go.

the_ray2d ago

Man I know what you mean, it's easy to wonder if someone's just slapping stuff down when they work that fast. But I've seen a few designers who can seriously think through the user flow while they're sketching, it's like their brain runs on fast forward. Most of those 30 layouts are probably rough wireframes with simple boxes and arrows, not polished screens. The real trick is knowing what details to skip so you can test the big ideas first. Sympathy for the ones who have to do it, it takes a different kind of mental endurance.