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Visual communication is a module in visual thinking school, a course designed to help you learn how to think and communicate better using the visual part of your brain.
Improving your visual communication skills will make your messages more clear, concise and consistent. A picture is worth a thousand words, and the better you can get at communicating with pictures, the better you will be understood.
Visual communication skills include your ability to interpret body language, present information effectively, as well as your seeing and drawing skills.
Links from Communication Nation
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Visual thinking practice
- Expressing emotion
- In this exercise you'll see how drawing facial expressions can help you understand them better. You'll also enhance your observation and visual communication skills.
- Bossman/geek
- Can you capture the dichotomies of your corporate culture in a single picture? Sure you can!
What is your body language saying?
Your body language conveys more than you may be aware. Whether you are happy or cranky, you broadcast your emotions by the way that you sit, stand and move. Your level of enthusiasm and participation in any group activity is easy to gauge, even from a distance.
Groom & Horse //...
Rearing Horse // Pin...
Dream Genie //
Spinning Wheel as Ac...
Miss Queen Bee of Pu...
BoHo Girl w Red Hair...
Two Girls // CityFes...
A Paris!
Natalie Sentz // In...
Visual thinking practice
Doing this will improve your skills of observation and also fine-tune your ability to "read" the body language of others.
Visual presentations
Research shows that when ideas are presented with pictures they have greater emotional impact and are easier to remember. When you present ideas to others, do you stimulate their visual senses?
Preparation
Revolution - behavio...
Communications Tools...
Social Tools & R...
Dramatic improvement...
Remaining upright (J...
Presentation Prep
Writing a proposal f...
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What people are presenting right now
All-Hands Buzzword B...
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Powerpoint poisoning
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Links from Presentation Zen
Fetching RSS feed... please stand byVisual thinking practice
Design a PowerPoint presentation with index cards
Next time you make a PowerPoint presentation, make a paper prototype before you create it on the computer.1. Get a stack of index cards. On each card, write down one of the points you want to make. Each card should contain a complete thought.
2. Now on your desk or tabletop, see if you can arrange the cards into three main groups. This is a way to organize your presentation into three high-level talking points.
3. Eliminate any cards that seem unnecessary or redundant.
4. Now lay the cards out in a linear sequence and revise until you like the order and flow.
5. Now you can create the presentation in PowerPoint with confidence in the story structure.
6. See if you can get away from bullet points by finding compelling visuals to illustrate each slide.
Communication delicacies
Fetching RSS feed... please stand byLearn more about visual communication
Understanding Body Language (Barron's Business Success Guides)
Amazon Price: $8.99 (as of 07/13/2009) 
Facial Expressions: A Visual Reference for Artists
Amazon Price: $14.93 (as of 07/13/2009)
Beyond Bullet Points: Using Microsoft PowerPoint to Create Presentations That Inform, Motivate, and Inspire (Bpg-Other)
Amazon Price: $16.49 (as of 07/13/2009)
You Are the Message
Amazon Price: $11.53 (as of 07/13/2009)
Visual communication links
- Learn to read and write Japanese smileys
- In Japan, smileys are an art form.
- Are people receiving what you're transmitting?
- Chris Brogan makes some great points on the difference between message sent and message received. He also offers some good questions to ask yourself before you communicate.
- The seven C's of communication design
- Designing your communication is an iterative process. It begins at a high level, with good questions and good listening; and ends in details; constructing a presentation, document, system or user experience. You can improve your communication by thinking about seven "C's" of communication design: The seven C's lay out a simple sequence which can help you start broadly and work your way down to specifics.
- It's time to move away from presentation mode
- Let's start moving from presentations to conversations.
- Lines of communication
- A free map showing the lines of communication in business.
- The corporate hip-hop presentation style
- Dick Hardt of Sxip completely captivates his audience with great visuals, great storytelling, and great timing. His presentation has a staccato, rhythmic quality, like a kind of corporate hip-hop.
- Attention = time
- Attention is time, as in 'where I choose to spend my time.' This is why this concept (whether we call it 'attention' or 'time' or what have you) is fundamental.
- What's your preferred communication mode?
- Improve your chances of being understood.
- Seven steps to better presentations
- Adaptive Path's Jeff Veen on how to give an effective presentation
- How to listen
- If you want to be a better communicator learn to listen, and more importantly, listen to learn.
- How to measure your communication effectiveness
- Do you set understanding goals for your important communications? Most people don't. Here's how to do it.
- How to make better presentations with story templates and storyboards
- If you use PowerPoint, check out a couple of free online courses:
Story Template 101
The PowerPoint Storyboard 101 - Presentation tips from Japan
- Read about some innovative methods from presentation masters of Japan:
The Takahashi method
The Monta method - How to present like Steve Jobs
- What makes Steve Jobs such a great presenter? It's not complicated, and, with practice, you can do the same things he does to make your presentations more effective.
- Is PowerPoint good or evil?
- PowerPoint. People either love it or hate it. There is no doubt that Powerpoint has had an influence on the world -- but is it a positive one or a negative one? And who decides? See what the experts say.
Next mini-course module
- Visual vocabulary
- Visual language, like written and spoken language, has developed over time. Your visual vocabulary is the set of elements, or visual "words" that make visual language possible. The greater your vocabulary, the greater your capacity to think and communicate.
- Back to main
- Go back to the visual thinking school home page.
