These Apps Change How We Work
What tools are actually worth adding to your workflow? In Episode 5 of Behind the Render, Chad and Nick swap their favorite apps, workflow shortcuts, and emerging technology. From Raycast and CleanShot to Gaussian splats and the tools they're using to explore them.
After last episode's deep dive into Mac vs. PC, Chad and Nick are back with a slightly different kind of Behind the Render: a conversation about the tools they use to work faster, communicate better, and generally make life at the computer a little easier.
First up is Raycast, one of Chad's most-used workflow tools. What started as an app launcher has become a much bigger part of his daily workflow, helping with everything from launching apps and managing windows to dictation, text snippets, and quick AI-powered writing improvements. Chad even uses custom shortcuts to drop his render tokens into Cinema 4D without reaching for the mouse.
Nick's pick takes things in a different direction. He's been spending a lot of time experimenting with Gaussian splats, a technology that captures real-world spaces and objects as millions of points rather than traditional geometry. He's particularly interested in the possibilities for preserving memories, scanning objects and rooms, and eventually being able to revisit those spaces in a much more immersive way.
Nick shares some of the tools he's been using to explore that workflow, including SplatKing for capturing scans and Postshot for processing them on a PC with an NVIDIA GPU. The processing can take some time, but once a splat is built, it can be viewed interactively in a browser with surprisingly little overhead.
Chad's next recommendation is a little more practical: CleanShot, a screenshot and screen-recording tool he relies on for communicating ideas, documenting workflows, and creating user guides. For someone who spends a lot of time sharing screenshots and GIFs, having a tool that makes those tasks fast and easy can make a surprisingly big difference.
And, naturally, the conversation gets a little weird. Chad and Nick talk about their obsession with screenshots, organizing years of them, and even keeping a personal archive of embarrassing Slack moments and frozen Zoom faces for future GIF ammunition. It's a pretty good reminder that not every useful workflow trick has to be about rendering.
The episode is ultimately less about finding the one perfect tool and more about experimenting with what works for you. Chad and Nick share what's working for them right now, and you can take whatever fits your own workflow...and leave the rest.
What tools are you using that you can't work without? Let us know in the YouTube comments.