I am terrible with a pen and paper and do all my concept designing in Rhino, how many of you work this way? Should i invest some time/resources learning to draw?
Heres my latest project, equal parts Rhino, Vray and Grasshopper. This was around 3 weeks start to finish.
i think there is nothing wrong with drawing directly in Rhino. if you have that tool available at any time and are proficient in iterating through variations as you want that can be a very efficient way to work indeed.
in my opinion some work done with grasshopper is a good way to procrastinate, having fun to learn something in the process, but maybe not the most efficient way at all times, since setting up all the bells and whistles often takes more time than heading for some idea you are previsualising which Rhino itself can often handle quite a bit faster (using history maybe and whatnot) that is of course if you are not fully into losing yourself toying with endless options and need 3 weeks to decide which one may be the best (if you have the time to do so of course) dont see that as a critique please.
it may be judged a bit too hastily, when i say that pencils and notebooks are outdated because using CAD directly for formfinding you are basically already outlining a finished product while using sketches with a pencil the shape still has to be translated into digital geometry BUT pencils can be a fast tool to explain certain details when working with builders etc. so i would never toss this option aside.
It never hurts to approach a design from different directions and mindsets. Sketching and modeling compliment each other.
I find the greatest synergy is to physically sketch over grayed out prints of 3d models. For my work this is between 8 sheets at the front end, down to two at the conclusion
Initially roughed out proportional models are printed, then again at each stage until completion. The process is: viewCaptureToFile, contrast reduced in Affinity, printed A4. Sketch and iterate.
There is something about the speed of pencil and pen to explore, then flip back through variations that beziering cannot equal.
Don’t worry about comparing your drawing style to ID sketch superstars, get the job done with what works for you.
Thanks guys for the responses. With Grasshopper im trying to get to a point of automating surface textures/geometry to add to my models built in Rhino. I know grasshopper is way more powerful than the use case im using it for but its all baby steps at the moment.
The printing and over drawing technique is interesting and an approach i hadn’t considered before, i will definitely give that a shot in the future.
I’ve never been artistic, but when I started modeling, I found it faster to start with a pencil. I’ll put down a few things in Rhino for scale, print it, and draw over it with a cheap light pad. I’m horrible with circles, so I bought some used drafting tools on ebay for the drop bow pencil (tiny circles) and the Maker’s Circle Iris for bigger ones:
I also watched several product sketching videos for other tips, like tracing paper and burnishers to transfer patterns from one page to another, using erasable mint blue Uni Nano Dia color pencil lead for the frame, etc.
Everyone has their own creative process to come up with designs, as such I would say there is no “wrong” or “right” way. But I would say that doing sketches by hand would free you from the limitations of the software. Sketching on the computer tends to constrain the design mind to forms that the computer program has an affinity for. That’s not necessarily a bad thing if your end goal is a more constrained form that can easily be manufactured, but it might limit your possibilities.
This reminded me of one of our first exercises in Architecture school which was to draw on A2 paper with very thick sharpies.
We were told to start every project this way drawing what came to mind and then starting a fresh sheet with any new idea and ideally doing it quite quickly to get the ideas flowing freely 
