About Me
Call me Angel (like in English, it's OK). I'm a designer in the windy city which I have called home for over three decades, give or take a few years.
Call me Angel (like in English, it's OK). I'm a designer in the windy city which I have called home for over three decades, give or take a few years.
As a kid, I was always drawing; I still have some drawings on notebook paper from back then. I started my design journey in college before smartphones were a thing. Then, my journey as a design professional really got going during the twilight years of newspaper.
I tried ClarisDraw on a Power Macintosh in elementary school, and I loved it. Then came Illustrator 10 and Photoshop 7.
Video games have been a major influence on me. I strive to make experiences as rich and engaging as video games are.
Chicago has been home for over 30 years and while the winters really sting, I can't imagine living anywhere else.
School of Art and Design (Class of 2007), University of Illinois at Chicago
I'm comfortable working in either Windows or macOS. I build my own desktop PCs and I'm always planning my next build even though I've had my current build for nearly 10 years. Alas, I have retired my Mid 2012 13" Macbook Pro.
Ancient but still kicking.
Honestly, you can't have too many monitors.
Dude you're getting a Dell!
I learned film photography and photo development in college with a Pentax 35mm film camera.
The only mac I ever purchased; alas, obsolete now thanks to Apple ditching Intel. We had some good times.
I'm an Android guy and simply can't let got of external microSD card storage and 3.5mm headphone jacks.
I've warmed up to iPhone over the years. This iPhone is primariy for development testing and as a spare camera.
I've been becoming acustomed to drawing on glass. I always wanted a Wacom screen but this will do for now.
Some of my favorite apps to work with.
For app and web design, Figma is my current go-to. I've used Sketch and Adobe XD before, they're pretty much the same.
For rapid prototyping that feels like the real thing, nothing beats Axure RP which I've used in place of live products.
Trusty old Photoshop! I love using it to color drawings, blend images, or animate GIFs. “It's pronounced JIF, not GIF.”
I feel most comfortable creating vector art in Illustrator. Maybe I'm old school but other apps just don't do it for me.
I love bringing designs to life with motion. I've created YouTube title cards with After Effects that were pretty slick.
I do miss working in print design. InDesign is my preferred app for page layout though I have used QuarkXpress before.
I enjoy non-linear video editing as much as the next guy. Premiere is my favorite, but I've used Final Cut and Davinci Resolve too.
For digital drawing and painting. My phone has a stylus, my tablet has one too. Sketchook has been the best on both.
Digital can't convincingly imitate the feel of drawing on paper, and I just can't let go of my sketchbooks, mechanical pencils, and markers.
I really want to break into 3D graphics and video games, so I've been tinkering with Blender.
I used to do this on Notepad! I've tried many other editors but have since settled on Visual Studio Code.
I prefer to make presentations in Keynote over PowerPoint, it's just better but it's only on Macs.
© 2013 – 2024 Angel Cortes.
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