You can draw!
Visual Storytelling and Live Sketching Workshops
Sometimes words are not enough to fully engage in the important conversations of our lives. Learn simple techniques to tell your story and to co-create meaning with others. Together we will practice using hand-drawn visual icons and metaphors to create simple visual notes and wall-sized charts to map and discover meaning with others.
During this hands-on workshop you will practice
- Drawing simple pictures to communicate big ideas
- Building a personal toolkit of visual metaphors and icons
- Connecting ideas and show relationships
- Creating a personal visual vocabulary
- Discovering that you already have the skills to draw
Can’t draw at all? Already an expert? No problem. All levels welcome.
Interested in scheduling a workshop for your team? Contact Patricia!
Resources for Visual Storytelling, Sketchnotes and Graphic Facilitation
On the Web
Sketchnote Army sketchnotearmy.com Podcast, Youtube channel, Community. “Sketchnote Army is dedicated to finding and showcasing sketchnotes and sketchnoters from around the world, from events, conferences, workshops or wherever sketchnotes are captured or created.”
Sketchnotes 101 Craighton Berman’s charming step by step for brand new sketchnoters. Beautiful, elegant guide to drawing sketchnotes. Doesn’t get any better than this.
Periodic Table of Visualization Methods. Rich picture overview of methods including templates for engaging conversations and opening dialogue at Visual-Literacy.org.
Gamestorming gamestorming.com/ Highly visual, highly engaging activities for teams dealing with complexity. Includes many templates for sticky note and whiteboard engagement.
The Noun Project thenounproject.com. Ultimate source for simple images. Don’t know how to draw something? Try your hand at sketching images from the Noun Project. “The Noun Project is a platform empowering the community to build a global visual language that everyone can understand.”- Great for practice and building a visual vocabulary.
Mauro Toselli’s Sketchnotes, Design and Make — Mauro xLontrax Toselli (maurotoselli.com)
Heather Martinez Lettering Tips for the Visual Practitioner (letslettertogether.com)
The Grove David Sibbett is arguably the granddaddy of graphic meeting facilitation. His pioneering work and vast network of facilitators and scribes can be found at thegrove.com
Inspiration for sketchnote beginners on social media
By no means is this a complete or definitive list of sketchnoters and visual thinkers I’ve found inspiring, but you can get a sense of the range of what’s possible by checking out the work of these fine folk.
Sketching Practice
Wendy MacNaughton (Draw Together) and Meanwhile in New York
Danny Gregory Sketchbook School
Visual Thinking Communities of Practice
The Visual Thinkers Society Collectively sketching & visualizing complex information to make sense of the world around us. DM for more 💌
Moderators @playthinklive (That’s me!) and my partner @manishalaroia
Facebook Group: Graphic Facilitation “
Nova Scribes meet up group “NOVA Scribes is a free and open forum for visual practitioners to share their knowledge.”
International Forum of Visual Practitioners “Over the years, our organization has grown into an international forum with hundreds of members. Our annual conferences are held in various locations, in and out of the United States, offering educational, marketing, and networking opportunities for our members. Become a member [internal link to membership] and be a part of our exciting organization, as we work together to advance the field of visual practice.”
Books
Blah Blah Blah – Dan Roam. New York. Penguin. –Solving problems with stick figures.
The Sketchnote Handbook, The Illustrated Guide to Visual Note Taking- Mike Rohde, Peachpit Press. Great place to start.
Picture This, Lynda Barry, Montreal, Drawn and Quarterly. Everything master cartoonist Lynda Barry touches is visual gold. Also check out Syllabus and Making Comics, both visual guides from her life-changing workshops.
Gamestorming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers Get your meetings moving, and visual with this book by Dave Grey and Sunni Brown.
Pencil Me In, The Business Drawing Book for People Who Can’t Draw – Christina Wodtke.
How to Mind Map: The Thinking Tool that Will Change Your Life – T. Buzan, UK: HarperCollins
Learning by heart, Teachings to free the creative spirit. Corita Kent and Jan Steward. Artist and educator “We can all talk, we can all write, and if the blocks are removed, we can all draw and paint and make things.”
Make a World, Ed Emberly’s Drawing Book – Ed Emberly- NY Little,Brown and Company. Draw like a kid again.
The Mind Map Book: How to Use Radiant Thinking to Maximize Your Brain’s Untapped Potential – T. Buzan & B. Buzan, Plume
The Graphic Facilitator’s Guide. B. Agerbeck, Chicago: Loosetooth.com. Also check out Brandy’s you tube channel.
Cartooning, Philosophy and Practice Ivan Brunetti.
Drawn Together through Visual Practice Anthology reflecting on best practices in visual practice.
Generative Scribing: A Social Art of the 21st Century Kelvy Bird, artist and co founder of the Presencing Institute dives in deep into graphic facilitation process and possibility.
Visual Meetings. David Sibbet. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Hefty and dense, great resource filled with templates and guidance for facilitating teams.
Video
Lynda Barry teaches us how to draw like a child
Tom Wujec’s TED Talk about visualizing wicked problems.
Cartoonist and theorist Scott McCloud’s TED talk.
Brandy Agerbeck’s Youtube Channel, “reclaim drawing as a thinking tool.”
Great Online Classes
Eva-Lotta Lamm on Domestika. I can’t recommend this class highly enough. Extremely good value for the money and for your time. Eva-Lotta Lam talks you through step-by-step through the theory and practice of sketchnoting.
Skillshare sketchnote classes. Skillshare offers a range of visual thinking classes for graphic recording and making sketchnotes.
Visual Tools for Systems and Systemic Design
Elanica EyeCues elanica.com/eyecues Complexity never looked so good. Peter Stoyko’s cutting edge graphics set a high bar for visual storytelling. “EyeCues is a showcase of the possibilities of visual communication and analysis. Second, EyeCues explores a variety of cutting-edge topics related to technology, governance, leadership, and public policy.”
Systemic Design Toolkit systemicdesigntoolkit.org Freely accessible tools for visualization and of complex systems. Where systems thinking, design thinking, and visual thinking meet.
Visual Representation of Complexity, Joanna Boehnert. “The poster provides a definition, examples, and a simple diagram to visualise a range of complexity concepts.”
Systems Viz Codex “Research project by Peter Stoyko exploring how visuals can enhance systems thinking, especially as it relates to inter-disciplinary, collaborative design.”
I’ve been teaching this skill for a while now! Sketchnote of my Visual Learning Workshop drawn way back in 2013 by Sacha Chua
Who’s talking about live sketching…
and what are they saying?
“Why Companies are Hiring Artists for their Meetings” CNBC
“For Polished Presentations, Think Visually” The Globe and Mail
“See What I Mean: The Power of Visual Learning” Fast Company
“How Graphic Facilitation Can Support Project Management” PM Volunteers
“We can learn to solve complex problems with simple pictures.” Dan Roam”
“Innovation is all about seeing around corners and imagining new possibilities. The act of visualizing supports this kind of ideation.” David Sibbett