Making your research come alive

GenAI sandbox - UCD

GenAI Sandbox by Visual Thinkery for UCD.

Bringing your research to life

Visual thinking and articulation has so much to offer the world of academic research. After listening to this podcast featuring Paul Nurse from the Francis Crick institute, I was ready to walk into their London offices and offer my services. Why spend months and years on a piece of research, only for it’s findings to be represented by a diagram that makes the reader’s eyes bleed?

We’ve used the Visual Thinkery creative process for many different research projects. We’ve created diagrams, illustrations and cartoons that summarise, highlight, or draw a reader into the research work that has taken place.

The Big Diagram

When it comes to an overarching diagram, things can get pretty complicated. How the pieces fit together, how important each part is, and how colour can be used to help understanding are all things to be considered.

Assessment for Inclusion - UCD

Assessment for Inclusion by Visual Thinkery for UCD. Making a diagram feel easier to understand actually makes it easier to understand. This is Cognitive Ease.

A Just Climate Transition - P2R

Regional Resilience Journey by Visual Thinkery for Pathways2Resilience. Talking through the complexities of a diagram, explaining to someone from the outside world how it fits together and what it means, is essential in producing a visual that can be easily understood. We can reinforce words with icons to underline their meaning.

Where does R&D fit into the economy - UKRI

CEO’s Communication Content by Visual Thinkery for UKRI. This 3D landscape was a rework of an existing 2D arrow diagram belonging to UKRI’s CEO. By adding humans we make it feel more human. By adding hand drawn elements, it feels more genuine.

The Relationship Model - University of Limerick

The Relationship Model by Visual Thinkery for University of Limerick. We used conversation with practitioners to explore every part of the model. This provided both the stories for each element, and the central metaphor of the mugs.

Visual Thinkery’s conversational process allows for exploration by talking around the subject. By stepping into the researcher’s world, we get to play the curious idiot (a phrase stolen from Einstein), and our questions prompt explanations. And in explaining anything to someone outside your world, you naturally reach for metaphors, stories and humour to illustrate your explanation.

Highlighting a particular point

Quite often, we create visuals that highlight a particular point made during the conversation. This can result in very simple portable cartoons useful for all sorts of contexts.

The Issue with Ranking - Assessment for inclusion - UCD

The Issue with Ranking by Visual Thinkery for UCD.

To use or not to use GenAI - UCD

To use or not to use by Visual Thinkery for UCD. Often a cultural hook presents itself within the conversation, that can then be used to develop a visual idea.

Glimpses of a Parallel World

Cartoons allow the exploration of serious stuff through an alternate, more playful, lens.

Giant perception of Legal Risk - Thirty Percy Foundation

Atmosphere of Legal Risk by Visual Thinkery for Thirty Percy Foundation. This cartoon for the Fiscal Hosting report breaks down an abstract point into a story – something the reader can touch and feel.

PhD Supervisor avatars - OU

PhD Supervisor Archetypes by Visual Thinkery for GO-GN Guide to Doctoral Supervision. Penguins were originally a sort of mascot for the GO-GN community, and now they’ve sort of taken over. This visual uses the playful mask of the penguin to explore a very serious topic: different types of PhD supervisors.

Playing the Game - University of Limerick

Playing the Game by Visual Thinkery for University of Limerick. Here were exploring an invented world of a roleplay game. This allows us to situate the humour in the recognised world, and make a meaningful point about Teacher Training and tricky social justice issues.

Trickle down knowledge - University of Limerick

Cascading Knowledge by Visual Thinkery for University of Limerick. This research project was based in Gaza, and the wider conversation often provides the context for the specific cartoons.

Ableism - University of Limerick

Ableism by Visual Thinkery for University of Limerick. Sometimes cartoons are created by joining a number of clues together, often from different parts of the conversation. Again, here we’ve created a related but recognisable world of Sporting objects to make a point about Ableism in Physical Education teaching.

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AI and the Future of Education (webinar)

An Educator's Repository of Ethical Statements to Opt Out (and other spells)

AI and the Future of Education (webinar)

I had the pleasure of live cartooning a webinar on AI and the future of education. facilitated by Doug Belshaw and Laura Hilliger of WeAreOpen Coop. They were joined by fellow thinkers Helen Beetham, Bryan Alexander, Ian O’Byrne and Karen Louise Smith.

The conversation was harvested in real time, using the hybrid approach of capturing ideas on paper during the webinar, and then developing them further afterwards on an iPad.

Some ideas came from the panelists directly, whilst others originated from the chat.

You can use these illustrations under a CC-BY-ND licence. 🙂

Life is lived forward but is understood backwards. A reflection on a quote by Kierkegaard.

Rear View Mirror by Visual Thinkery

An angel emoji representing ethical engagement. A devil emoji representing an unethical tool.

 Ethically engaging by Visual Thinkery

A man's head is considerably enlarged by an AI pump.

 The AI Cognitive Amplifier by Visual Thinkery

An educator makes a presentation in an assembly hall. The ChatGPT logo is connected to a rig stating "OpenAI unaccountable power" which in turn is surrounded by the Microsoft Monopoly.

 Behind the scenes of AI by Visual Thinkery

A man says that he's focusing on the things that make him distinctively human. The AI suggests that Dad Jokes are very predictable.

 Distinctively Human by Visual Thinkery

The AI is telling you that it eats cognitive development for breakfast.

 Cognitive Development by Visual Thinkery

A person walking through the door of a walled garden with the "No AI" sign above the door.

 Safe Spaces and Walled Gardens by Visual Thinkery

An Educator's Repository of Ethical Statements to Opt Out (and other spells)

 An Educators Repository of Ethical Statements by Visual Thinkery

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Visually recording a conversation

so you want to record a conversation

Visually recording a conversation

Most of what I create has its roots in conversation.

Open conversation sits at the heart of Visual Thinkery’s “10 ideas” process. Usually I’m able to record it and then go back through and visually harvest the conversation for visual ideas. However, I employ the same tricks when capturing live conversation in a sketchnote. Drawing anything can seem like a conjuring trick – and there’s definitely something to be said for that magical feel. I take a messy conversation as it wisps through the air and I lay it out in a visual landscape for others to wonder at, both during and after the event. An artefact is created from a unique set of people and their thoughts at a single point in time.  

Watching it unfold

Both online and in-person, it’s possible to display what is being captured in real time. But displaying the visualisation of a conversation as it’s being conjured changes the nature of that conversation. People can point to where a previous part of the conversation left off – and add their penny’s worth. Have you been in a meeting where you realise you have a great bit of insight, but the conversation has moved on? Having a visual map allows you to go back, insert a piece in the emerging puzzle and jump back to where the conversation is. It can be a really useful feature when capturing a conversation of a large group.

There are a lot of knobs to twiddle when thinking about visually recording a conversational event. Some of which might be fixed depending on the intended output whilst others may be flexible.

Here are a few things to consider:

Setting – Where are people? Does the technology enable everyone to have an equitable input to the conversation?

Voices – How may people will their be? What does this mean for the quality of the conversation?

Openness – How open is the conversation? Will it be a one-way monologue (like a keynote address)? or sequential monologue (like a webinar)? or multi-way dialogue?

Facilitation – How guided with the conversation be? Is there time and persmission to explore tributaries and cul-de-sacs?

Structure – Is there a certain bunch of material that we need to step through? Or certain themes and topics that need to be covered?

Context – How much context do I need in order find meaning in the conversation (or even facilitate it). Can I play the curious idiot or do I need a PhD?

Audience – Who are we ultimately creating for? An internal or external audience?

Form – Where is the priority: to create something pretty? or create something meaningful?

Granularity – Are we trying to capture all the things? Or should we focus on a nugget if come across it?

Humour – a cartoonist’s greatest weapon – how will the conversation encourage the possibility of humour?

Here are a few examples

Aligned Values and Behaviours

Facilitated conversation between a group of social activists about what they have in common. 
Setting: offline Voices: some Openness: dialogue Audience: Internal Form:ideas

Big South London - Live draw - People and Skills

Panel discussion at all day event.
Setting: offline Voices: a few Openness: sequential monologue Audience: external Form: art

Open Education at a crossroads - Catherine Cronin and Laura Czerniewicz - oer24

Keynote at OER24 conference on Open Education (Cork, Ireland)
Setting: Theatre Voices: one Openness: monologue Audience: external Form: art

Fairytales and Dystopian futures - Rajiv Jhangiani - oer24

Keynote at OER24 conference on Open Education (Cork, Ireland)
Setting: Theatre Voices: one Openness: monologue Audience: external Form: art

GO-GN conversation

Internal Project Brainstorming conversation
Setting: online Voices: a few Openness: dialogue Audience: internal Form: ideas

If you’d like to talk more – please get in touch!

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What is it we do again?

Visual Thinkery Services

What is it we do again?

I am a cobbler. I spend so much time with other people’s shoes that I completely neglect my own. Every once in a while, when there is a big enough lull in the pipeline of work, I experience some lost-ness which results in me second-guessing everything I do. This is the season I am currently in and although somewhat disconcerting, it does have its upside.

When I’m busy, I yearn for the mental space to be able to tumble some things around. Lost-ness has been crucial to me discovering new paths (the Remixer Machine being a good case in point) – to have the time for curiosity to nudge me through a different door.

I have a good look at the path beneath my feet and I wonder how it got there. Then I notice my shoes. Boy, do they really need some love… 

So what do you do Bryan?

I wonder how someone is supposed to understand the services provided by Visual Thinkery, if we don’t try to explain what they are and how they work. So I sit down to try to articulate what we actually do. I already share lots of examples of the creative output (recently updated!) on the website. But the Visual Thinkery process itself is where the gold lies – and our clients really only see why it works once they’ve been through that process. 

After revisiting the projects completed in the last year, I attempt to group them into separate stories:

Visual Thinkery Services

I then wonder if I could create a service map that might make sense to someone visiting the Visual Thinkery site for the first time.

Visual Thinkery Service Map

Clear as mud? This is, as ever, a half-baked work-in-progress. In fact, this whole operation is a half-baked work-in-progress. But then again, I wouldn’t have it any other way…

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INC-4: Global Cartoons for a Global problem

Welcome to INC-4 Ottowa

Global Cartoons for a Global Problem

Goodness knows we need one: a global treaty on plastics. But Big Oil with its stranglehold on the stuff of life is lurking with unlimited lobbying resources. Their playbook is one learned from Big Tobacco and Big Sugar: delay, distract, derail…

Last week, I was covering the fourth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-4) for the BreakFreeFromPlastic community as they met in Ottawa, Canada, to develop a legally-binding global treaty on plastics.  It’s always a bit weird covering a conference when you’re not physically present. The beginnings of my best cartoons (in my humble opinion at least…) often emerge from an insignificant bit of detail in a conversation. A throwaway comment. A metaphor leaned into. The beginning of a story. So instead I have to rely on having eyes and ears in the ground and a whatsapp group for creative members of the community to throw things into Bryan’s cartoon ideas melting pot. It would be impossible without my contact – she’s actually at the conference, able to corral the troops and filter out the noise, preventing ideas from getting over-thought and overcomplicated.

Biobabble
One of the initial moosy ideas for INC4...

I sketch up ideas in black & white – so as not to be distracted by colour. It means that I prioritise contrast over colour – which is important as there are some parts of the message that really need to pop. 

When you’re creating a cartoon, you’re inside it. It becomes very hard to see it objectively as someone else would with fresh eyes. It’s similar with humour. Once you know the joke, it’s different second time around. So it’s easy to go from being initially tickled by an idea to binning it within the space of half an hour. So the process is this:

1. Catch the idea

2. Sketch it up

3. Move on (before you kill it…)

Time Machine
So much time was wasted revisiting the treaty scope. Kicking the process into the long grass is a tactic as old as time…
Its a marine litter problem INC4
This cartoon was originally drawn 5 years ago, but it is still as appropriate today… 🙁 It was remixed and reused following “Plastic isn't the problem” comments from the Exxon CEO leading up the negotiations.
Co-opting concerns
Was this idea too edgy? Possibly…
Ha Ha Hadditives
Have you ever thought about the presence of toxic additives in plastic products? No, me neither.
Bioplastic
Bioplastic is the future! Oh now hang on a mo…

When it comes to Plastic Pollution, I’ve learned so much from the people I’ve had the privilege to work with. Not so long ago, I was completely oblivious to so much of the plastic world around me. My own ignorance, curiosity and learning form a key part of the cartoons I create.

Micro and Nanoplastics
There were several interventions to avoid the inclusion of Microplastics and Nanoplastics - and the metaphor of “shedding a little skin” is actually a direct quote from one of the delegates…
Ineos - you make me sick
Ineos - a huge virgin plastic producer - were forced to shut down their local Styrene production plant near Ottawa due to having released high levels of benzene in the air, making some of the conference participants sick. I mean who writes this stuff?!

Making a cartoon work for a global audience is far from straightforward. However, you’ll know when an idea has resonated when the request comes to facilitate the translation of the cartoon into another language. This in itself can be problematic – and it comes with two main pitfalls. 

Firstly, other languages can obviously use a different number of words to say a phrase. Especially if an idiom is used. For example – “You’re pulling my leg” in Finnish becomes “You’re pulling me by the nose”, in German “You are taking me unto your arm”, and in Russian “You’re hanging noodles from my ears”.  In a cartoon the speech bubbles form an integral part of the artwork, and they evolve as the artwork evolves. Suddenly having to change their shape or size to accommodate a few extra words can cause a real design headache.

 

The whole nine yards
A visual idiom that probably won’t translate…

Secondly, writing is much slower and proofing is much more difficult. A missing accent or misspelt word is so easy to do, and might remain unspotted to the very last. This adds time to the to-ing and fro-ing of finalising the artwork. I’ve toyed with the idea of making remixable cartoons using the fabulous Remixer Machine. I’ve already created a few comic fonts of my own hand, so giving participants the ability to remix a cartoon with different words is very possible. Hopefully I can have a prototype of the remixable cartoon built for INC-5 – watch this space!

 

The bridge to busan
The final leg of the treaty process will take place in Busan, South Korea at the end of November.

You can read all about the INC4 conference progress (or lack of it) here: https://www.breakfreefromplastic.org/2024/04/30/inc-4-negotiating-countries-fail-to-respond-to-the-magnitude-of-the-plastics-crisis/ 

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