I have always been a bit of a gearhead, not just because I love gizmos and doodads but because tools have changed my life. Let me tell you about a few of them.

I'm going to skip over obvious things like sketchbooks, watercolor field kits, and Tombow Fudenosuke brush pens.

Instead, I'll start with the Apple IIC.

In January of 1984, Apple released the Mac, and the world changed forever. But Macs were priced like BMWs and way out of my reach as a young copywriter. However, four months later, they released the Apple 2C at exactly half the price.

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This was not my first computer — I'd owned a thing called the Radio Shack TRS-80, which was basically a word processor that stored files on cassette tape — but the IIc allowed me to do several game-changing things in addition to using floppy disks. I could fire up AppleWorks to create crude images with a mouse. And it had a modem so I could get online. At first, that just meant connecting to Citibank, but soon thereafter came my second life-altering tool:

America Online. In 1993, AOL deluged the world with free installation disks. 🤯 For the first time, I got (e)mail. A couple of years later, I installed Mosaic and then Netscape — the first browsers — and I stepped out onto the Web. It’s hard to remember how exhilarating it was to travel the Internet back in those days. It was a constant revelation, from Mapquest and CNN Live to BBSs like The Well, to Flickr, the image sharing site, to the first video livestream that showed a coffee pot in Cambridge.

In January 1998, I built my first website, “a gathering place for folks in wheelchairs looking for information and good company.” Disabled people were among the first heavy users of the web, as it was a way to communicate and share without having to leave home. Here’s what curbcut.com looked like in 1998. It became my first online community as people not only shared information but also used my bulletin board to share stories and make invaluable friendships.

My next website was a place for me to share stories and drawings. Here’s DannyGregory.com in January 2001. It has not aged well.

Quark. In mid-1991, I got a Mac in my office and was also able to install QuarkXPress. Soon, I was cranking out my very own books from my very own laser printer. I was a desktop publisher! Seeing my words typeset on paper with multiple columns and an array of fonts was an incredible thrill and inspiration. I created books of poetry, short stories, novellas, how-to guides, and, occasionally, the ads I was being paid to write.

Ham Radio. In 2002, I found a loose-leaf binder at a flea market on 26th St in Manhattan. Inside were hundreds of handmade postcards — which turned out to be the QSL cards that ham radio operators send to each other to confirm their radio connections. This led me to write my very first professionally published book, Hello World: A Life in Ham Radio.​

I had wanted to have a book, any book, published since I was five years old, and this one was a beauty that got a full-page write-up in the New York Times. Knowing that I could, in fact, be a published author was an enormous spark to my creativity. Good thing I went to that flea market! I am also a licensed (expired) ham, KC2KGT, now too.

WordPress. In May 2003, my pal Richard Bell inspired me with his wonderful blog, Wild Yorkshire (he’s been blogging regularly for 27 years!), and I started my own with this silly post. At first, I wrote primarily for a small circle of friends, but over time, my audience grew. And grew. The thought that I could just type on my screen and reach lots of people with any idle, unedited thoughts eventually became my job. Having a reason to write and create regularly for an interested audience has been the fuel for everything I do today.

​DannyGregorysBlog.com is still out there, with many years of posts, but five years ago I switched to a weekly email newsletter, the one you're reading right now.

DSLR. On the 4th of July, 2011, we went to a barbecue at our friend Juan's house in Westchester. As the fireworks exploded overhead, Juan brought out his newest toy, a Canon 5D. “Here,” he said, “make a video,” and handed me the camera.

Now, I had spent most of my adult life hiring other people to shoot commercials for me, but that night I discovered that I could make professional-looking videos by myself. This was not a Super 8 or a VHS camcorder. It shot high-resolution images with blurry backgrounds, bokeh, adjustable settings, interchangeable lenses, all in a handy portable size.

The next year, I had mastered my own Canon and we were filming the first videos for Beginning, the intro course for what was to become Sketchbook Skool. I uploaded our first videos to YouTube. While most online teachers were using webcams or written PDFs, Koosje and I had professional lights, lenses, and mics, and were fulfilling our dream of making content comparable to Netflix’s Chef’s Table for artists. That 4th of July freed my mind.

iPad. In April 2010, Jack and I arrived early at the Apple Store in SoHo to snatch up our first iPad. It was a fun gizmo, but it wasn’t until the following spring that it became indispensable. On March 26, Procreate was released. For $10, I could own my own art supply store, one that glowed like a stained glass window. At first, I tried to copy what I did in my paper sketchbook, trying to emulate watercolor and ink. But soon I branched out to make pure digital art. I decided to draw a different breed of dog in a different style every single day. I posted them all on Instagram, daily for over 100 days.

At first, I was a little defensive about making art this way. A lot of commenters said they wished I’d go back to analog means. But I noticed that so many of the illustrators I admired were making the same sort of experiments. The iPad has become an indispensable artist tool for most pros. I put together a course called “Be an iPad Artist”, so I could share my ideas and tips and encourage a new generation of digital artists. I still use my iPad almost every day, but increasingly less for casual art making. Now I use digital illustration in conjunction with video, like onscreen drawings on YouTube and my animated film, The Artist Who Couldn’t Draw.

Zoom: For most of the first decade of Sketchbook Skool, we made video courses with multiple teachers. People love being able to watch at their own pace and return again and again. But I had seen on YouTube the power of community around art making. Each week, Draw With Me brings together thousands of people who sketch along. I wished we could do the same with our courses.

I knew that the technology to livestream lessons was commonplace, but many of our students were unfamiliar or even wary of the new technology they’d need to install to make this possible.

Then came the pandemic. Everyone quickly learned to use the technology that would allow them to stay in touch with their families: Zoom. We were able to start doing live workshops (we did over fifty) and then launch Spark, with up to five hours of live streaming classes a day. Zoom transformed what we did and how we did it, creating a wonderful living community that continues to thrive on and offline.

A couple of years ago, we decided to go back to our roots. I am now the only Sketchbook Skool instructor, and our courses are produced the old-school way, recorded in advance with my DSLR(s). People seem fine with it.

And these days, I experiment with so-called AI tools, like ChatGPT, Midjourney, and Runway. They help me organize and edit my writing, brainstorm and create images, videos, sounds, and more. It’s a thrilling (and problematic) frontier that I'm sure will move me into new paths as well.

I love tools. Some are fun to play with and experiment with. Some expand the possibilities in ways that I could never anticipate. Bleeding-edge gizmos become tried and true. Tools I initially used for one thing morph into something quite different and then are replaced by the next generation.

And one thing never changes. My pen, sketchbook, watercolors, and colored pencils are like my family. But I’m always glad to make new friends.

Your pal,

Danny