I’ve completed three graphic facilitation/recording engagements in the past two weeks, and my ears are starting to pop from the vertical gain on this learning curve. Along with the lessons learned in on-the-fly visual listening, I’m starting to develop quite the little collection of paraphernalia for photographing my charts. In the past month I’ve acquired a new digital camera, a tripod, a floodlight (which isn’t helping me), a large selection of new markers, and a few extra gray hairs from fiddling about with software to edit and improve completed charts.

Here are a few tricks I’ve learned, to help others who may be on their own journeys:

• Get GIMP – Graphic Image Manipulation Program. It’s a free, open-source program like Photoshop. Runs on PCs but I’m not sure about Macs.
• If you’re having trouble with uneven lighting of your charts, either move your chart, or try using a gradient over your image (in GIMP/Photoshop) where the gradient mode is “Dodge” and the opacity is about 50% or less. Other settings: foreground color should be white, gradient type should be linear. Start your gradient at the darkest point of your image and drag towards the lightest point. This lightens up dark corners from the way your chart is aligned in relationship to the light source. THEN you can adjust contrast or levels to achieve an overall effect.
• Get yourself a cheap wooden yardstick from Staples ($2 or so) to help create borders around your charts.
• Island Blueprint does scanning of charts, but at $8/sq foot you’ll probably want to wait until you have something incredibly important and permanent to scan. That’s $256 for a 4′x8′ chart. Owch.
• Use Google Image search and select “clip art” for type of image, then enter search terms that are likely to come up as themes or topics in your recording/facilitation work. Copy the images to a folder on your computer to start building a visual vocabulary.
• Crayola thick washable markers are great for doing chart work on easel-size paper if you’re dealing with a small group and want to do your visuals on a boardroom table instead of on the wall. (Of course we all know I’m a total marker junkie so this was just an excuse to buy more pretty markers).

I’m looking forward to sharing my latest set of charts with you!