Interview with Jacob Gube of Six Revisions

Jacob Gube is the man behind Six Revisions, a popular web design and development blog. Over the last several months I’ve gotten to know Jacob a little bit through email, and he is easily one of the most responsive and helpful bloggers that I’ve come across in the design blogging niche.

If you’re not already familiar with his blog, I recommend that you subscribe to his feed and connect with him on Twitter (his profile is jggube). At Six Revisions he posts some content that will really help you to become more efficient and productive as a designer.

From reading your blog and from the interaction we’ve had, I know that you have a wide variety of interests and knowledge from development, to graphic design, to more technical issues with hosting and servers. What’s your background and how have you managed to get such a diversity of knowledge?

My interest in web design started at a fairly young age, almost as soon as I bought my first computer. That interest quickly grew into other things related to creating websites and web applications. Professionally, I started as a freelance graphics designer focused on developing brand identity materials for small to medium-sized businesses.

Like many web designers and developers of my generation – I’m mostly self-taught. A lot of my knowledge comes from experience; making mistakes and learning from it. My passion for web development and everything that surrounds it pushes me to constantly learn new things as well as look at things I already know in a different perspective.

Six Revisions has really taken off in only about 6 or 7 months of existence. What do you envision in the future for the blog?

I’m surprised that Six Revisions grew so quickly, and I’m a bit overwhelmed by it all. One thing I want to do is launch a new design within the next 6 months. Additionally, I want to increase the number of articles I post on Six Revisions. Not only will I write more frequently, but I’ll also be more proactive in finding guest and regular authors that readers will appreciate. Other than that, I want to give back to the community by providing freebies such as WordPress themes, JavaScript/jQuery scripts and plugins, and publishing practical tutorials on web design and development.

Do you have any other blogs or websites?

Six Revisions is my sole focus at the moment. I have a couple of things I want to push out by the end of the year – but they’ve been gathering dust since early this year.

What tools and resources do you use on a daily basis that you couldn’t live without?

Most people who read Six Revisions can see that I’m a big fan of novel, nifty, and useful tools, but I try my best to keep my work set-up as uncomplicated as possible.

For graphics design/creation, I use Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator. My primary development environment is Adobe Dreamweaver CS3 in conjunction with Firefox and the Web Developer Tool and Firebug extension. I also use Notepad++ which does syntax highlighting for even the most obscure languages.

What or who are the biggest influences on you as a designer?

I have several, but one I’d like to mention is Jason Santa Maria. I think his designs are unique, functional, and detail-oriented. Web design is about the little things; there are millions of web designs out there, and it’s how you handle the details that distinguish you from the rest and Jason Santa Maria’s work reflects that.

What are some of your favorite design-related sites and blogs?

This is tricky; I have hundreds of sites I subscribe and visit regularly, so I know I can never provide a complete response (but I’ll give it a shot anyways).

The blogs I read regularly are (in no particular order): Design Reviver, PSDTuts, Vandelay Design, Noupe, and Blog.Spoon Graphics.

For design inspiration, I love The Best Designs and Best Web Gallery.

Other sites that aren’t specifically design-related are Digg (you can almost guarantee that when I’m online, I have Digg’s Design/upcoming and Programming/upcoming open in browser tabs), Dzone, and Design Bump.

Thanks to Jacob for taking the time for this interview.