Sketchnotes: Visual Thinking That Drives Innovation

KERSTIN STROM: Is that better? Can everyone hear me? All right, perfect. But basically with sketch notes, you're combining the Two So that you're not losing the important any important details, but you're also getting your point across much faster. So that's exactly how we've gone and broken down our worksheets for getting people started with sketchnoting.

To do a brief overview, we're really kind of makes sketchnoting, I guess, visually compelling is the combination of text, layout, color, and imagery. And we're just going to jump right into this. Instead of doing a typical drawing warm up, you're going to take the pages that you have. If you could flip them over onto the backside, we're just going to do three super quick rounds to play around with text. It'll give you an opportunity to play with shape and really start to play with the idea of visual hierarchy.

So this isn't supposed to look designerly. This is supposed to be quick and dirty. This is about creating shapes with the alphabet that really give you an opportunity to warm up your hand eye coordination, but also to just start playing around with how you're drawing letters on the page. So if we could do that really quickly for two minutes, starting now.

Title and text emphasis, and just going to do a really quick three minute minutes on that one.

Is everyone ready to move on to the next exercise? I know, everybody. It's been a long week. Everyone's exhausted. Going to just fly through this so that-- but this part of the exercise is where we're going to get a little bit more creative and a little bit more fun. I call this the sandwich. So what you're going to do is you're going to take your paper, flip it over to the main worksheet area, and the whole idea behind this is to show how you can break down information, create great images for it, and then create a nice instructional to again get your idea across. So this is the no brainer or the intro one.

The assignment here for the right side-- or I'm sorry, for the left side of the workshop that has the turtle over it that says right, you're going to write on instructions on how to make a sandwich. There's no limitations on what kind of sandwich or even how creative you want to get for how you get that sandwich. But take the next three minutes and just plain write out the instructions about how to go about, like I said, making your sandwich starting now.

Is everyone ready to draw how you build your sandwich? Going to give a little bit more time for this round, and four minutes and go.

AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE]

KERSTIN STROM: It doesn't matter. Really good question-- you can use both markers if you'd like. Everybody do a little bit of a shake out? I know that, for a lot of you, this is a lot of drawing, more drawing than most people have done all month.

So we're going to take a little moment here, just sort of look over the information that you put on here. Last part of this round of challenges is you're going to be combining the two. Now something to keep in mind is treat this a little bit like an informational for, let's say, somebody who doesn't speak your language. How can you be combining the key important parts of your sandwich, the visuals to help guide them along in a way that really tells a story, this is a very simple, easy way to do it that they're going to instantly be able to get.

I know at first it's a little bit of a challenge, but honestly there's no right or wrong here. This is about learning a new skill set for yourself. So with that in mind, we are going to set the timer and, if everyone is ready, all right go.

Perfect. So I've got a couple of questions for you. How many of you is this your first time sketchnoting? Wow, OK, excellent. Second question-- how many of you made your favorite sandwich? How many of you, instead of making a sandwich, wrote out instructions on how to either order delivery or pickup? There's always one in every class. Who thinks that they have the best sandwich sketchnote? Do I have any volunteers for a Autodesk water bottle willing to share?

I was going to say, Ken, would you mind talking us through your final sketch note.

AUDIENCE: So we have here how to make a meat, cheese, and bread, with a little turkey, a wheel of cheese bisected, two slices of bread, and an assembler.

KERSTIN STROM: Everyone, round of applause for Ken. Thank you. I just wanted to show you some examples from the last workshop that we did, except for it was, how do you make a cup of coffee. Only two people did instructions on how to order from Starbucks. So this is where we're getting into a little bit more of the meat and idea portion of sketchnote. This third exercise is you're going to be concentrating on your elevator pitch.

So what this basically is going to encompass, whether you already have your 30 second elevator pitch that you get professionally or want to make a new one for yourself, this is more of an opportunity to write down what do you do, who you are, what your focus is, and where you want your future to go. So we're going to spend-- and I was going say, if you need any more supplies or paper in the back, take a minute to gather those up. And then I'm going to start the timer again, and we're going to do the same sort of format. We're writing in the one column. Then we're going to start synthesizing the ideas and drawing them out.

So again, asking yourself the question, basically, what do you plan on working on or doing next. And I'm going to get the timer started now. So hopefully everybody has a lot of material to work with. This next part can be a little bit challenging. I was going to say, don't be too hard on yourself. Right now the challenge to yourself is going to be, what kind of iconography really expresses everything that you just wrote-- so whether it's a location, whether it's an action. I'm seeing a very confused look over there. Sometimes there are keywords that you can just pull and focus on and just draw those out.

Also one of the ways that I personally cheat-- and I'll show this later-- is I go to the Noun Project and look up different icons that are associated with different words, but basically you're looking to create the imagery behind your story. So is everybody ready? thenounproject.com. So if everyone is ready, I'm going to start the timer.

This is honestly a challenge that a lot of people in the business incubator section have always struggled with a little bit. It's, how do you really put imagery with your ideas. So last part of this-- we're going to do the same thing that we did with the sandwich. And we're going to be combining the keywords, the key things that you want people to know and to be getting across combined with some imagery that really helps tell the story.

Bonus challenge is if you could do just a quick sketch of yourself within your sketch notes. So is everybody ready for our last round? We're going to just close things down quickly. Could I possibly get three volunteers willing to compete for best sketch note elevator pitch? I was going to say, one in the back. If I could possibly get cat dog thrown in there, as well-- yes, I would love to see you-- William, if you wouldn't mind presenting yours. If you guys wouldn't mind coming up here real quickly.

AUDIENCE: Go for four.

KERSTIN STROM: Go for four? Yes, please. Thank you for letting me put you on the spot, but hopefully this is fun little way for you to, I guess, do a little personal pitch. If you wouldn't mind starting.

AUDIENCE: Sure, my name is Eslie. I love to draw. So that's why I'm here. But I work for a subcontractor. I have a design and engineering, a drafting background. I help support our drafting team. When they need tools, ideas, and standards, I'm the one they all go to. The goal is to make them faster, better, make everything easy so we can build and make our customers, in the end, happy.

KERSTIN STROM: Nicely, thank you.

AUDIENCE: I am originally from Montana, but I work and live in California now. So I [INAUDIBLE], try to get outside as much as possible. And then I do work in architecture-- so design and building, all that fun stuff.

KERSTIN STROM: Thank you, Megan.

AUDIENCE: Born and live in Boston, and my idea was an app that shows historical buildings or neighborhoods that have an since demolished for whatever reasons we decided to do that. So it's a lot of historic images embedded in the computer and coming through Revit or Max or something and spit out to some AR app [INAUDIBLE].

AUDIENCE: I'm Jacob from Kansas City, and I like the problem solving aspect of architecture. So I did a problem needs solved and two little characters, and then I do sports architecture. And so just bringing people together, and Mr. Solve says, bringing people together, and he's holding everyone. And they are all smiling. You can't tell.

I love creating unique and new ideas. I couldn't come up with a unique idea. But I decided to combine a dog and a cat. So now everyone has a cat-dog. And the last thing is just about making people happy. So everyone gets a cat-dog, and they're high-fiving and saying "winning."

KERSTIN STROM: Excellent, guys. I was going to say, round of applause. So just to do a really brief recap, the most important thing that you need to remember for sketchnotes, is just breaking it down to shapes, imagery, and text and, most importantly, ignite the kid inside. Let yourself be able to play with these sketch notes, because it's going to change how you absorb the information, but also how you're able to really playfully explain things to other people or be able to share your ideas, such as cat dog.

As I mentioned earlier, one of the things that-- I tend to be a very linear thinker. So sometimes to be a little bit creative or when I'm really stumped on words or trying to figure out how to visually connect with my audience, this is my favorite sheet. You just go on thenounproject.com, type in the word, such as an innovation-- which we've all heard a million times this week, but how do you really draw it out? Go to Google searches or sites like the Noun Project are great for giving really simple icons that really help drive your ideas forward.

So in summary, the tips that we like to leave everyone with is to summarize-- is really focusing on summarizing and listening to the information that you're bringing in. Go as simple as possible because, again, it doesn't matter if you're coming up with an amazing da Vinci painting or you're just doing stick figures. The only important part of that is the idea.

Color to highlight is great. The reason that we had you work with just one marker is a lot of times people try and throw everything on the board. And you just get lost in the details. Usually sticking with one color really helps you emphasize your point and keep things easily to mentally digest. Don't be afraid of leaving white space because it really can really help frame your ideas. And then, again, don't be intimidated about how good of a sketcher you are. This is all about being able to utilize it day in day out whether professionally or in your personal life.

So with that note, does anybody have any questions. Yes?

AUDIENCE: I find [INAUDIBLE] drawing a lot-- that it really helps me to see what other people are doing, because they're a good resource with sketchnotes. [INAUDIBLE].

KERSTIN STROM: Yes, actually I was going to say-- sketchsquad-- we do have our own Facebook page. And we're building a database of all the-- actually right now we're focusing on putting sketch notes to graduate research because, if anybody has ever had to read a graduate dissertation, it's not meant to be understood by anybody outside of academia. So it's, how can we take information that's almost impossible to digest and make it so that everyday people can understand it. That was a very, very long answer.

There are a lot of ongoing online resources. Actually, I brought along two books in case anybody wanted to get a little bit more detailed information on building out their sketchnote skill set. I'm happy to pass that or show that to you afterwards and also talk about other resources. But online, it's a growing movement right now, but it hasn't really been played with, certainly not on the professional education level as far as changing the design process. So you'll see a little bit more of that on our Facebook page and Instagram.

Any other questions? All right, thank you very much. I hope everyone has a great time or has a great time at Autodesk University. And I will be around if you have any questions or want to do some follow up. Thank you.