Category Archives: Storytelling

Let’s Hear It Podcast

The The Let’s Hear It! Podcast is covers the world of foundation and nonprofit communications, and I have known Eric Brown, one of the hosts for more years than I can count. So I was excited to be asked on as a guest to talk about effective presentation design with a particular bent towards the nonprofit world which I have been working in for as many years as I have known Eric.

It’s a great and funny conversation that has covering a lot including why you want to “make your content like a Twinkie.”

Take a listen!

 

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Categories: Design, Information Design, PowerPoint, Simplicity, Storytelling.

Investing in Our Presentation Design Business: The Presentation Podcast Episode #93

The Presentation Podcast

 

Episode #93, Investing in Our Presentation Design Business is up!

Troy, Sandy and I kick the new year off with a discussion on just where we put our money to invest in our presentation businesses—everything from what’s physically in our offices to software and subscriptions.

Take a listen!

Subscribe on iTunes and check out the show notes for more info.

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Categories: Design, PowerPoint, Printed Information, Showing Data, Storytelling, Visual Thinking.

When Scientists Present (Conversation w/ Mike Morrison): The Presentation Podcast Episode #87

The Presentation Podcast

 

Episode #87, When Scientists Present (Conversation w/ Mike Morrison) is up.

Troy, Sandy and I welcome Mike Morrison, someone who has been making some waves in the world of scientific presentation with his proposals for better and differently designed science posters.

We have a wide ranging talk about how scientists present, how they can present better and why graphic design might be the key to curing cancer—well, kind of. But you’ll have to listen to hear more about that.

Take a listen!

Subscribe on iTunes and check out the show notes for more info.

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Categories: Design, PowerPoint, Printed Information, Showing Data, Storytelling, Visual Thinking.

Presentations in the Courtroom: The Presentation Podcast Episode #70

The Presentation Podcast

 

Episode #70, Presentations in the Courtroom with Kerri L. Ruttenberg is up and live!

Troy, Sandy and I welcome our first legal guest, Kerri L. Ruttenberg, to talk about trial graphics, how presentation is used in the courtroom and her fantastic book, Images with Impact: Design and Use of Winning Trial Visuals.

Kerri is a top DC litigation attorney and probably the top expert in using visuals in the courtroom in the country. I reviewed her book a while back when I first learned of it, but now we get to dive a bit deeper and hear more about the psychology of visuals, what can and can’t be used in a courtroom and what the state of the trial graphics industry is.

Even if you never plan on working in this area of presentation design, this is a really good conversation in which you’ll learn a ton not just about how to convince juries with visuals, but how to convince your own audiences.

Take a listen!

Subscribe on iTunes and check out the show notes for more info.

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Categories: Design, Information Design, Interviews, Presenting Live, Simplicity, Storytelling, Visual Thinking.

The Power of a List

A visual will almost always trump text, but sometimes text functions as a visual itself. The other day a client who offers a SaaS product called asking if there was a better way to show feature options across various versions than his current tabled list. I can’t show his list, but it was very similar to this from Quicken:

We’ve all seen things like this and the reason is that things like this work quite well in quickly comparing and contrasting in order to make a decision. This is a time when simple checkmarks or missing checkmarks serves as a highly informative visual story.

Today I received an email from Jim Johnson, a New Jersey gubernatorial candidate contrasting himself with his primary challenger. And I loved it. It was nearly all text, but the repetition of Murphy’s limited diversity of experience was easily readable and served as a glanceable visual with a big story.

Sometimes a table is simply the best choice. And sometimes text does communicate visually.

 

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Categories: Design, Information Design, Storytelling.
visual training presentation