the 10 and a 1/2 commandments of visual thinking

Dan Roam has made an addendum to his great book "on the back of the napkin"!



Check it out on this link!
http://www.changethis.com/44.03.TenCommandments
Tanx Martien and Armand!

JAM INTERVISON - 4th of July, 2008

On Friday the 4th of July JAM organized an intervision day for some of the freelance artists who work for us on a regular basis . Every visual thinker who attended has sufficient visualization skills, which they developed in different ways coming from different backgrounds.

Morning: warming up
To get the day started we began with a simple sketch-warming-up. By letting the group speed-draw several 2D or 3D objects with a 10 second time limit and the group shouting out drawing subjects. After this quick session we followed up with a session centered around metaphors. While the number of sketches on the wall grew we could start to discuss the apparent differences and overlap in visual results… We explored the choices made and discussing the way to tackle certain abstract subjects like trust or unraveling.




Afternoon: Dutch Society
After lunch we split up into groups to visually tackle our shared visions on the subject: ‘What is society?’. The 4 groups, consisting of 2 to 4 people showed some interesting differences in their visual strategies, or how they used their visual skills to define their visions and translate those visions to presentable posters.

The first group (4 persons) used their sketching skills as a brainstorm-tool. By associating on each other’s visuals, they enriched them in order to get grip on the subject. This ‘brain-drawing’ was helpful for investigating opinions, but a shared visual translation of the subject wasn’t achieved. This was seen in their presentation: 3 different posters with a shared theme of playing cards, visualizing a social dilemma.

The second group (2 persons) made a visual which came into existence by doodling of the 2 members of the group, sometimes even in 1 drawing. This made the image grow organically… its was enriched by mutual associations and questioning. The final drawing was highly detailed and somewhat unclear, but fun to watch and supporting the story told.

The third group (3 persons) came up with a lot of ideas and directions, but because the ideas were discussed instead of visualized, it was hard to get to a shared focus. The presentation depended on the visual note-taking of the discussion and was therefore very fragmented. Nonetheless the different views were powerful, simple, illustrated and clear.

The last group (3 persons) used metaphors as a tool to search for a common point of view on the subject. Knowledge was used to ask the right questions. At first the members were drawing individually, while discussing. All the visuals made were spread out on the floor. Their design-proces was literally at their feet, making it possible to refer to it or be inspired by early ideas. At a certain moment it was fascinating to see that a group could be totally focused on 1 member, when he was able to speak and draw at the same time, where the doodles supported his talking.

By observing the groups there was an important lesson learned:
“A discussion without visualisation leads to straying, but supporting a discussion with visuals gives a natural focus.”


Remarks and questions
For JAM this was the first time we organized this workshop. We weren’t sure how to shape the day but we knew it was a good idea start sharing visions. One thing that was important was that there would be enough time for discussion and exchanging visions.

Some things which were said in the final discussion:

Asking the group about their personal experiences in this workshop the overall answer was that everyone got a feeling of solidarity. Most of the visualizers who were there are used to working alone. The value of this day was to come together to get to know more about how colleagues work and how they stay motivated to draw. This day was a good way to let yourself be inspired and actively share your personal point of view.

The attendees felt like visual pioneers and ambassadors who are at the start of the main development of a visual language. They want to create and try out new techniques and promote their value to the masses.

Challenging questions let to an interesting set of discussions.
What is it that makes a visual understandable?
Is the use of clichés a problem?
Should a visualizer be innovative all the time?
Is a visualizer allowed to repeat his/herself, which could lead to the problem of ‘image-inflation’, or should he/she always challenge his/herself.
Does a visualizer have a set of pictures in his head, a visual database, or is it all about a way of thinking? In what way is he/she a visual gateway or does the personal view have an influence on what’s been drawn? Or does a visualizer have so much experience that his/ her vision is just as important?


It was an enjoyable day and everyone went home with new insights. Enough reasons to organize another drawing day in the near future….

DAVE's W H I R L

DAVE's W H I R L

Check out Dave's Breakdown of visual language!