Freehand drawing has agency of independent thought

The arguments for and against drawing, or rather thinking on paper versus digital devices, such as tablets have been going on for years. Yet no firm conclusion has been reached either way. Yes, drawing on digital devices and facilitated by software is generally considered to be easier and faster. And sharing digital work is much faster than sharing paper sketches. Also, improving, deleting, scaling or copying is more convenient on a digital device than on paper. Yet drawing on paper is a grounding experience - the friction of the pencil on paper guided by the hand has a different feel to it compared with using a stylus on a screen assisted by software. But when creative deadlines are tight, paper drawing can be seen as a time-consuming luxury. But, as practitioners of drawing on paper would argue, this is a luxury needed to allow designers to work transparently and stay creative in the early stages of designing. That is, the freehand drawing, in contrast to the "black box" of computing, is capable of expressing thinking and feeling that completes the original quality of the idea of design. Although it is for individual designers to decide what tool(s) they find most beneficial for their ideation practice, the aim of the workshop is to raise awareness of, and to engage with a range of contemporary ideation tools.