Note: I love the blog, “Thesetup” and hope to be on there someday. Here’s what I’d write,, today.

Who are you, and what do you do?

I’m Fred Schechter. I’m a freelance industrial designer. I do a bit of everything, from products, to apps, to packaging, to displays. I also pride myself on being one of the world’s most boring racecar drivers. This ensures people don’t mind me driving their racecars. It sadly also ensures I’ll never be a professional racecar driver. Oh well, when I get to do it, it’s a blast. Also I have a Phd. Scientist wife of awesomeness, along with a tiny human being who is amazing (yes, parents always gush).

What hardware are you using?

I’m on a Lenovo T420, pretty new, but works great. I’ve got an older Dell 19″ flatscreen I plug it into and having never used 2 screens before, I will NEVER GO BACK! I use an older logitech bluetooth mouse and what I have to, I resort to an even older 4×5 Wacom tablet for heavy duty graphics gunk. My phone is an HTC Vivid, love it, (my 3rd droid) I don’t root, because I don’t really code and thus, I don’t need to get into any more trouble than I already do. For paper, I Love my Livescribe pen. Please go get yourself one, I cannot state that enough. I do a lot of packaging design and so Alvin cutting mats, X-acto #11 blades, and bone scorers are all worth their weight in gold. Another must have is copious amounts of magic tape from 3m, it really is magic (get the 3″ roll you’ll be glad you did). I exclusively use a Mr. Coffee coffeewarmer. To this day I don’t know what took me so long to get one, another loved item for sure. I have a Neat portable scanner that I break out when I have to. also a huge Western Digital Drive to hold,, well, music and backup to a bit. Believe it or not, loving my new chair from Wal Mart (just moved to the midwest from California and shockingly Wal Mart has more than you ever imagined.).

And what software?

I do a bunch, so I use a bunch, for working, the Adobe Suite, SolidWorks, and Rhino start me out. Also Aperture when I need to render. Livescribe, Evernote, and Google Drive keep me fairly sorted as a spare brain (and my phone of course). Facebook, Skype, and Twitter keep me in touch. I’m a Chrome user all the way. But for real fun, it’s my logitech G25 and GTR2 for racing practice.

What would be your dream setup?

I think a screen that could be flexibly sized (no idea how that works) with the new tactile screen buttons from tactus I saw the other day, something that goes from phone size to 50″ widescreen that can go from glossy to paper texture and be see through as well as be used as a cutting mat. That would be a pure dream. In the mean time, I’d love a cintaq with a nice 17″ laptop (I had a monster 19″ from Toshiba but it was just too much to lug around). Also I need a real seating solution so I can drive my racecars digitally without sitting in an officechair. An old indycar seat would be sweet!