No. 243 · January 20, 2023

Kyle Mills Hall

Digital & physical product designer, company builder and music maker from Southeast Texas

Southeast Texas

Kyle Mills Hall is a co-founder and Chief Product Officer of swivl, the automation platform for the self storage industry.

He makes music under the names Dudd and fogboi. He occasionally puts out YouTube videos reviewing tech and audio gear. He’s also launching a Podcast soon called Designers Who Hate Designing.

He recently finished a year and a half trip around the country in an RV.

Follow Kyle on Music, YouTube, Twitter and at kylmls.com.

What is your favorite item in your workspace?

Since I was a kid, I always wanted an EcoSphere. As an adult in my 30’s, I decided recently that it was time to finally have one. The little glass orb sitting on my desk is a materially closed ecological system which is self-sustaining over a period of years. At room temperature, and with only low light input, the algae produce oxygen which supports the shrimp and bacteria. Bacteria break down the shrimps' waste. This provides nutrients to the algae and bacteria upon which the shrimp feed. It reminds me of how small things can be, but also, how small we really are in the grand scheme of things. It centers me.

How do you spark creativity?

There’s no taming it. Just be prepared to work when it hits. It can be tough, but sometimes you have to say no to things or cancel plans (or meetings 😉).

How do you manage work-life balance?

Get away from the desk. Since I work from this space and also use it for personal projects like making music, it can be easy to never leave. I have to periodically get outside and disconnect.

Kyle’s gear

10 items.

On the desk10

Computer 14” MacBook Pro M1
Max-ed out (10-core CPU, 32-core GPU, 64GB RAM, 1TB SSD) - this thing is crazy fast
On 64% of the desks we’ve published
Monitor Apple Studio Display Shop
pretty pricey, but worth it IMO. It’s not as bad as some of the reviews say. The screen is top notch, audio is superb, and the camera is… meh. But, it doesn’t bother me because it’s getting squashed to 240p for your video call anyway
On 17% of the desks we’ve published
Speakers Kali Audio LP-6 V2 6.5-inch Powered Studio Monitors in white Shop
Incredible sound for the price. I use these to listen to, produce, mix, and master music.
Hub / Dock Universal Audio Volt 276 Audio Interface Shop
My main sound card. It has a compressor built in, which I use for my microphone. I mainly bought this one to help make sure my voice doesn’t clip / distort on video calls when using my “fancy” mic. See my Youtube review.
Microphone Audio Technica AT2040 Dynamic Microphone Shop
I use this for important video calls, voice overs, podcast recording, and YouTube videos. At $99, it’s a great all around dynamic microphone. I also have a Youtube review for this.
Headphones Beyerdynamic DT 770 PRO Headphones Shop
These are becoming kind of a standard in the music production world. Probably because they are inexpensive and sound decent. They’re not perfect, but I like them better than my Audio Technica M50’s. These are lighter and more comfortable for longer listening sessions. The high end is also clearer, although a little sibilant at times.
Lamp Neewer 14” Round LED Video Light Panel Shop
I’m in a really bright room, but sometimes you need a little fill. I also use this at night or when recording YouTube videos. It has variable brightness and color temperature controls. This one is way overkill. I usually keep it at 1% brightness. For a small room, I would get a size or two down from this one.
Accessories iPod Mini 2nd Gen
I have recently gotten into old music formats, including mini disc and old iPods. I’ve replaced this iPod’s 4GB micro drive with a 64GB Compact Flash card. This gives me more storage and better battery life. There’s something that I miss about the slower, more deliberate process we used to use when selecting music. Nowadays, It’s so easy to search for or tell Siri to play one of millions of songs. The act of curating a finite number of songs & playlists gets me excited about the music I’m listening to.
Desk IKEA Bekant Sit/Stand Desk Shop
I don’t stand often, but I like being able to adjust the desk depending on my mood that day. Some times I want it lower. Sometimes I want it higher. I’m tall, so my sitting height is just under the height of my fiancé’s standing height. We both share the same office. She sits next to me and uses the same desk. However, we’re pointed away from each other ever so slightly (it helps that we have a bay window with three sides). It doesn’t feel like we’re sitting next to each other at all. But, if we need to interact with each other, we can simply swivel a bit.
Accessories Various synthesizers and noise makers
I’m really into synthesizers and making electronic music. My collection ranges from my first keyboard / synth (Korg Triton) to digital recreations of classic synths, to beast analog Moog synthesizers.

On the screen16 apps

Sketch
I’m totally on the Sketch train. I use it mainly for UI design, but will do some logo / layout work in it. I’ve happily been putting off switching to Figma (don’t @ me)
Slack
at swivl, we live on Slack. We’re a small, fully remote team and this has worked pretty well for us.
Rocket
don’t sleep on this. You know how in Slack you can type a colon, followed by the text of the emoji you want to use? Well, this plugin for the Mac brings this globally to every app. It’s wonderful :sunglasses:
Paste Bot
another one you shouldn’t sleep on. If you find yourself copying and pasting text often, this is a game changer. You can copy a bunch of individual rows of data, it adds it to a queue, and then you paste them in order, wherever you want (among other features).
1Password
there are several out there, but please use a password manager. 1Password has been great.
Magnet
A simple window management tool for Mac. This lets me resize windows super fast.
Shortcut Bar
It puts a little icon in your Mac tray that lets you access commonly used information. I use it to quickly grab swivl Styleguide Hex values.
GSuite
Gmail and Meet are daily drivers for us
Hey
I’ve been using this for my personal email since they launched in 2020 and have been really happy with it (except for a few UX things that they refuse to fix).
Adobe Suite
the more I can get away from the this the better, but I still use Photoshop, Lightroom, Illustrator, InDesign, After Effects, & Audition.
Final Cut
I’m moving away from Premiere for video editing. I still have some learning to do, but so far it’s so much better.
Ableton Live
my go to DAW for music production
Waves Plugins
Most of my third party audio VSTs are Waves. I have a handful of random plugins, but Waves has been my go to
Logic
I will sometimes use this for simple audio editing / mixing–things like podcasts or mixing / mastering for a friend.
Apple Music, Spotify, Sirius XM
I subscribe to multiple streaming services. I can’t get enough music.
YouTube Premium
I watch so much Youtube. I find it to be a wonderful learning tool. I recently canceled Netflix and all other streaming services, but kept Youtube.