Performing graphics: Fine art or applied art?

Don’t answer that question! (on advice of visual counsel)

There are certain distinctions dangerous to make. And certain questions that only solidify those dubious distinctions.

If you know that someone is using a computer to spontaneously generate images for a live audience, what exactly do you know?

Is there text?
Is there graphics?
Is there music?
Are there bar charts?

Is it for fun?
Is it for profit?
Could it be for both?

Will the material be on the final exam?

Are you enthralled or bored out of your skull?

It’s time to stop drawing permanent lines of demarcation for no purpose. They will only bite you in the butt later on.

As the raccoon once told an audience in Japan, “beware of Westerners bearing distinctions”.

Text vs Graphic
General vs Special
Group vs Individual
Beginner vs Expert
Social vs Technological

and now

Fine Art versus Applied Art

The sooner we stop trying to make these distinctions — trying to make them once and for all, permanently, applicable in every situation — and instead see them as contextual decisions of local practicality, then the sooner we can enjoy the cross-fertilization of dancing over boundaries.

Wouldn’t you like to be one of the folks boogying in the back because you were so moved by the content and the spirit of the live imagery?

The group’s ideas at the Tuesday afternoon meeting never looked so good.

For a good overview of the very fine applied art of performing graphics in service of group communication, see Lynn Kearny’s site.

And for a complete trampling under dancing feet of the dubious and dangerous fine/applied distinction, see the last chapter of Live Graphics Nightly.

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VGA out for iPad SBPro, finally!

Kudos to AutoDesk — they did it right.

The image you are creating appears live on the big screen as you draw it, but the SBPro menu does *not*. The control menu only appears on the iPad for you alone to see and use.

Thanks to Rachel Smith for tipping me off that SBPro for the iPad had been updated.


Now that graphic recorders can work live using the iPad, this brings up a dilemma. If you only work full size, then at any time the group can see the entire record of the discussion. But you are limited in how small your lettering can be.

Jonny Goldstein‘s image is a good example:
(image (CC) Jonny Goldstein)

*Or* if you zoom and pan to get more detail, then while you are doing that the group will not be able to see the big picture.

This image of Rachel’s has lots more detail:
(image (CC) Rachel Smith)

But, as Rachel says, she has “concerns about sensitive persons in the audience watching my mad panning and zooming as I work,” and concludes that, “I think this is a great process for personal recording, but not yet for group work.”

So bottom line, iPad SBPro is like Zeno’s Paradox — it may never quite get there, but it keeps making progress in the right direction, and may soon be close enough for most practical purposes.

Which in the meantime leaves plenty of time for some darkhorse like vmacs for the iPad to slip in. Stay tuned!

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actual iPad-based graphic recording

Good News!

Graphic recording on the iPad is here. The screen has the resolution, and SBPro has the graphic richness. That’s great, since those things are hard to change.
(image (CC) Rachel Smith)


Needs Work:

1. Live output to big screen. Not yet, but this is a solvable technical problem. Autodesk *should* be working on VGA out for SBPro right now; the capability is available to third-party apps. Meanwhile, for the examples below, neither of the practitioners featured were working in view of the group.

2. Operating SBPro fast enough for live output. Well, at least it's very close, see below for comments from the pracitioners. And, hey folks, speed is *merely* a matter of practice, right? (raccoon said cavalierly).

Examples:

More great examples, one set by Jonny Goldstein and the other set by Rachel Smith.

Rachel Smith

She describes her experience of doing visual recording on the iPad in wonderful detail on her blog.
(image and accompanying text (CC) Rachel Smith)

The above image is her representation of the keynote at the “Northern Voice 2010″ conference (sounds^H^H^H^H^H looks like a good one!). And here is a link to the rest of her visual records from the conference.

Rachel comments:

How Does It Relate to Visual Practice? Well… I wouldn’t use it (yet) for visual facilitation, where I’m interacting with a group and helping them work through something. It’s not as natural as pens and paper yet so I would be too distracted, I think. What I was doing at Northern Voice was visual recording, where I’m just listening and making notes.

Then there’s the issue of the size; when you’re doing visual practice with a group, either recording or facilitating, you want the group to be able to see what you’re doing. I have not tried projecting the iPad onto a screen while working, so I don’t know how that would work, but I’ve heard that not all apps can be projected yet [...] I think this is a great process for personal recording, but not yet for group work.

Software. I tried Autodesk SketchBook Pro ($7.99) and Adobe Ideas (free). All the notes in my Flickr stream were done with SketchBook Pro. The controls in SBPro are very easy to access while working [...] The controls in Ideas are a little harder to master and are a little too fiddly for me to use quickly while recording.

Jonny Goldstein

Jonny made “SketchNotes” of the speakers at the “140 Conference NYC 2010,” as desribed in detail on his blog. Here’s his sketch of the talk by the guy from Kodak:

(image and accompanying text (CC) Jonny Goldstein)

Jonny reported to me:

I played with it on a friends iPad for a couple of hours prior to doing these images. That’s it on the mobile app. I have used the full featured version of SB pro on a laptop for a couple of projects.

Yes, I added the not-hand written text on the first page in Photoshop after I created them in SB pro.

To get the images off the iPad, I emailed myself the files from the iPad. That is an included option in the SBPro app. You can email them to yourself with layers intact as a PSD (photoshop file), or as a flattened jpg. In order to do this, I used the iPad’s included email app.

My workflow: generally I would do my text and drawing as thin black lines on one or more layers. Then I would come in afterward and lay down thick strokes of color on a layer underneath the black lines.

Hardware: 1st generation iPad, Pogo stylus Software: SketchBook Pro App

And here is a link to his set of SketchNotes.

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wall scrolling for paper hangers

Folks, I was doing the paper thing long before I ever touched a computer.

I love the smell of grape watermarkers and the feel of butcherpaper under my fingers and being able to turn and see the whole group, and simply the raw size and physicality of big paper.

In fact, back in the day, raccoon did a series of tool designs for paper-based visual performing media.

The first system was developed by using the phrase “Group Graphics” as guiding light and problem definition. It was observed that groups of designers often wrote and drew together as part of thinking about a problem. Big pads of paper on a table could not be seen by everyone in a group, flip charts on a wall were too small, and black boards did not support color, high resolution or saving of images. The solution was the “Wall Scroll,” a large sheet paper dispensing system for use by groups.

Here we see the Wall Scroll in use by David Sibbet at a meeting of the CORO fellows, San Francisco, California, September 21, 1971.

(hey, David, I’d like that prototype returned to me if you’re no longer using it 8-)

More details and description of other systems on the wall scroll page.

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can dogs program?

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visual programming languages

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Visual Darwinism: survival of the fittest graphical tools

Look, folks, the iPad ain’t the digital graphic recording tool of your dreams. So get over it. As Jonny Goldstein said in a comment on a previous post, the iPad’s got price and portability. Which means there will be tons and tons of ‘em out there, and tons of people trying to use them to do live visual meeting support. Which will mean in turn that:

First, it’s going to bring public awareness to the visual practice of graphic recording like never before.

Second, it’s going to put the burden of proof on established practitioners with fancy tools to show they can do better than some kid with an iPad.


It will be great for all concerned, practitioners and clients alike.

Visual Darwinism, you gotta love it. Competition improves the breed, etc.

In the early Seventies motorcycle road racing was dominated by two very talented factory riders on incredibly expensive machines made by MV Agusta in Italy and Honda in Japan. Then along came Yamaha with revolutionary and far cheaper equipment. Suddenly everything changed and once again “privateers” like Jarno Saarinen had a chance.

The new technology, along with incredible drive and talent, allowed Jarno to “… intimidate the factory riders on the GP circuit by clinching the 1972 championship as a privateer, and in the process broke lap-records practically everywhere he went. Jarno was also his own mechanic and helped modify and develop the bikes according to his style of riding.” (Peer Landa).

Prediction: for the great digital graphic recorders of the future, this last sentence will describe their ongoing relation with their rig (rig = hardware/software instrument for performing graphics).

No, Virgina, it’s not like a guitar — one size does not fit all.

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Postscript: since this post was originally made, a lot of great group graphics have been done on the iPad. See some of the images here.

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