Thanks to inspiration from Mike Rohde, author of The Sketchnote Handbook, I started getting into sketchnoting a few years ago.
I found that I had a similar experience as Mike. I used to attend lectures or conferences, take scrupulous notes, and never look at them again. And I was so busy trying to get down every word the speaker said, I would often not actually be paying very good attention to the material.
But when I started sketchnoting, I found that I was having to really focus on the presenter’s material, and it kickstarted a different part of my brain, as I was creatively taking notes, and trying to think of symbols, pictures, icons and text to draw for the ideas that were being presented.
So now you can pretty much be sure to see me sitting with a Moleskine and either my Lamy Safari fountain pen, or some Staedtler Pigment Liners, whenever I’m at an event or conference. I take the notes in pen, and then will go back and add any details I missed, and also add watercolors as well.
Available for Sketchnoting Your Events
If you are hosting an event that you would like recorded in this creative format – please let me know and we can discuss how to make that happen. I use Mike’s term, sketchnotes, but others refer to them as visual notes or graphic recordings.
Samples of Work
I have a few PDFs that include sketchnotes from entire events, which I will list below. And then I’ll share some of my favorite sketchnotes in a small gallery below that. Enjoy.
- 2014 NEXT Church National Gathering (I couldn’t attend, but watched the livestream and sketched from that)
- 2014 Progressive Youth Ministry Conference
- 2015 NEXT Church National Gathering
- 2015 Progressive Youth Ministry Conference
- Hearing US Representative John Lewis speak about his new graphic novel, March