Rogier van Bakel says:
As a photographer, I developed repetitive stress injury (RSI) in my right shoulder and wrist last year, due to too much mousing around in Lightroom and Photoshop. The pain got worse this summer so I decided to switch to a trackpad and a Wacom tablet. Much better, but it bugged me that while I had the tablet on my lap, I still needed to reach over to my desk so much to type Lightroom commands on my keyboard, assign photo ratings, and use various drop-down menus.
What I needed was a large lap desk that would let me keep all three devices together.
To my surprise, I couldn't find one — but I did, fortunately, come across the work of St. Louis-based woodworker Nancy Klemm on Etsy. After I sent her a quick sketch, this is what Nancy custom-built for me out of cherry, maple, and bubinga wood:
The desk has a removable bottom cushion to ensure it sits comfortably on the user's lap.The total price was $140, shipped (subject to change).
I'm chuffed about Nancy's meticulous craft and the beauty and utility of my new lap desk. It occurred to me that other photographers, graphic artists, and designers might want to have something similar made, so I thought I'd send this your way.
