Celebrating our Lead Designer Tony Thomas

Tony Thomas, Medialoot's lead designer, is the epitome of what it means to be an awesome graphic designer. Since he began working for Medialoot in January 2011, Tony has created 684 graphic resources and counting, all of the highest caliber. Everyone in the team loves to work with him and admires his amazing work ethic.

Tony is easily described as a multi-talented designer, but his work really shines when he creates UI/UX elements. Some of our most recent favorite resources of his are:

SEO Vector Icons

iOS 7 Alternate Color UI Kits

Vintage Infographic Vector Kit, and his

Distressed Earth Backgrounds

We'd like to take the opportunity for you to get to know Tony a little more! We've interviewed him about his working style as well as asked some silly questions. Join us in celebrating Tony's great work and continued contributions.

Tony's Design Background

• How long have you been designing? Pretty much since we got our first family computer. I was about 14 and had just figured out that it was possible to make your own websites and actually put them on the internet for other people to see! I thought this was amazing and spent almost every waking hour thinking of new ideas for websites and hunting down the best animated gifs to adorn them with.

• At what point in your life did it click for you that design was your thing? I think it was at high school when I became known as the go-to guy for designing websites. Up until that point I had been always been very focused on fine art at school so my design style was quite artistic and grungy, perfect for the rock and metal music that my friends and their bands liked to play.
• What did you study in college and how did that prepare you for what you do now? I studied Design at university, it was a very broad course that covered graphic design, web design, typography, art history and 3D/product design. Although I knew deep down that web and interface was my speciality it was a really enjoyable experience. And got a lot of insight into different areas of design.

Working From Home

• What are the biggest challenges and benefits for you of your working situation? I love the flexibility of working from home, because it really puts you in control of how and when you work. The biggest challenge I face is keeping motivation levels high, in this situation there is no boss looking over your shoulder, or colleagues to turn to.. So you have to find ways to motivate yourself!

• Do you listen to music when you work? What do you listen to? I can't imagine working without music! It can really you help you get motivated and lose yourself in what you're working on. My tastes can be a little unusual but they range from classic Synthpop to Rock/Metal and Industrial/EBM. I'm currently listening to a lot of Editors, Hurts, Gary Numan and White Lies.
• Do you work better at night or in the morning? I'm not a morning person by a long shot, but it is definitely the best time for me to work. My mind is much more focused in the morning, and I enjoy having the freedom to continue into the night if necessary. I think if I didn't start work until the night I'd wake up in my office every morning with my face planted on the keyboard!
• What's your desk look like when you're in the throes of designing? Much the same as before I started but with extra iDevices and scraps of paper with doodles on scattered around!

Tony's Work

• What is your favorite part of the design process and why? Although the ideas and planning stages are what I think are the most important part of the design process. My favourite part has to be the tweaking and refinement stage. I'm obsessed with trying to achieve perfection, so this always my chance to exercise that part of me and really focus on all the small details.
• How do you keep up with trends or learn new skills? If you frequent design related blogs and communities on the web, and have an interest in learning new things then I've found that it's quite easy to keep up to date. I like to browse though sites such as Dribbble, Webdesigner Depot and Smashing Magazine amongst many others, and when something catches my eye I'll read up on it and focus in on it. Which usually results in searching the web for more examples and so on and so on.
• Where do you find inspiration? As I mentioned in the last question, design communities such as Dribbble are great for quick inspiration hits and keeping up to date with the latest trends. But I often find inspiration strikes in places you aren't expecting. For example I have been inspired by the atmosphere of certain video games, the tags on a new set of jeans and quite a common one for me is listening to a new album I haven't heard before.
• What is your favorite recent design and why? My favourite recent design has to be the Audio UI Controls set. It was inspired by my latest synthesizer and I just spent hours trying to make each individual element as beautiful yet simple as possible.

• What advice do you have for budding designers? If you enjoy designing, and would be happy to live, sleep and breathe design. Then you already have everything you need to succeed! My advice would be to try as many different techniques and approaches to design as possible, the best trait that a designer can have is flexibility so try not to limit yourself to one particular skill set or visual style.

Getting to Know Tony a Bit More

• How do you take your coffee? It goes against the typical stereotype of a web designer I know, but I'm actually not a big coffee drinker. I like to kick off the day with a shot of Espresso for which I rely on my trusty Nespresso machine, and after that a cup of traditional British afternoon tea is enough to keep me going.
• We know you have an adorable dog named Wednesday. If she were a celebrity or famous figure, past or present, who would she be and why? Ah that's a tricky one. She is very expressive, has loads of character and no matter what your mood, her funny little face can always make you smile. She kind of reminds me of a female Boris Johnson!

• What's your own power animal? I've never really thought about it, it would be pretty cool to be a Red Panda though. They seem really content and playful, not to mention adorably cute!
• What are your favorite hobbies outside of design? At the moment I'm really enjoying writing and producing music, it's useful to have an alternative outlet other than design to express myself. And I'm enjoying spending time at the gym, it keeps me active and allows me to forget about whatever else is going on and just focus and working out.

• What's the best movie you've seen recently? I'm a big horror fan buff, so I really enjoyed the movie You're Next which was released recently. I liked it's unique take on the typical slasher thriller film that tried not to take itself too seriously, the soundtrack was perfect and although the storyline was predictable it was a very enjoyable watching experience!

We hope you enjoyed learning more about Tony; we certainly did! Again, we're so grateful for the phenomenal work he's done for Medialoot and we look forward to his next 684 resources ;)