Presto Sketching

A book to help you think and communicate better with drawing

Archives for January 2018

Easy ways to show more diversity in your sketches

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Life is full of all kinds of people, and your sketches can be too, with these ideas and examples.

Do you want your presentations and business communications to be more inclusive, and show more diversity, but you don’t want to use those cheesy contrived multi-racial stock photos?

Well, help is here! Let’s look at simple ways to sketch diversity in simple figures and faces for your presentations, and other things like whiteboard drawings in meetings, user interface designs, journey maps, and storyboards.

Let’s back up a minute. What do I mean by ‘diversity’? Rather than every figure in your drawing being a white male, I mean showing a variety of figures and faces, in terms of gender, age and life stage, ethnicity and sociodemographic background. This makes your communications much more inclusive.

“Whoah, Ben!” you might be gasping, “That’s a tall order! I can barely draw a figure that looks human, let alone a variety of humans!” Good news – it’s easier than you think. Once you start doing some simple sketches like these (instead of using hilariously bad stock photography), the greater your confidence will be to share them and use them in your own work.

In sketching, detail and diversity go together

Look at the range of faces below. The more abstract a face, the less you need to worry about diversity, but the more detail you add, the more diversity — or lack thereof — will become an issue. Work on a sketching style (or fidelity) that’s got only a little bit of detail; that way, you can suggest diversity in easy, economical ways.

Think about head shape

All of the examples I show you here are using a low level of fidelity; simple lines, no mouths, that sort of thing. This is great for anything from whiteboard drawings in meetings, to slide presentations and design work. Firstly, think about the shapes of the heads you draw. Almond-shaped heads with slightly pointy chins appear more feminine, squarer-shaped heads appear more masculine. Weird-shaped heads appear alien (hey, we’re being inclusive here, right?).

Hair’s the easiest way to variety

Drawing a variety of hair is the easiest way to indicate a variety of gender, age, and ethnicity. The picture below shows how adding just a simple line here and there can indicate things like plaits, a ponytail, or a bun (a man-bun, maybe?).

Once you master those simple lines, try drawing different shapes and varieties of hair as seen below: young spiky hair, long wavy feminine hair, emo hair with a streak through it, permed hair or balding hair. Close-cropped curly hair is also a good way to show someone whose gender is not identified by hair shape.

Beards, facial hair, and accessories like headbands, glasses, caps and other headwear are also great ways to indicate various nationalities, ethnicities, styles, and ages:

Little details mean a lot for different ethnicities and religions

It’s worth investing a little bit of time practising the faces below, so that you can include different ethnicities and religions in your drawings.

Seen here in the top row from left to right: a Sikh turban (the dastar), a Muslim skullcap (taqiyah or topi), two Indian head coverings (chunni), and an Indian woman with a tikka and sari. In the second row from left to right: a Buddhist wearing a Kasaya, an Asian female (the clothing is simple enough to be a Vietnamese áo dài or a Chinese cheongsam), two hijabs (simple enough to be Al-Amira or Shayla style), and a niqab.

Being more inclusive when sketching figures

Just like the faces above, the figures drawn here are really simple. By thinking about different ages and stages (childhood, parenting, older age), we can add a whole lot more variety to the figures we sketch. Here are just a few examples:

Think about different life situations (like parenthood), and different levels of ability and mobility as well.

One thing I like to think about when doing more inclusive figures like this: even if I do a figure with a walking stick or in a wheelchair, I never want that thing to define them as OLD or DISABLED. That’s a stereotype. Instead, I like to include a little detail to show some character in some way, so that they’re not perceived as a stereotype (e.g. old people use smartphones too! A woman in a wheelchair can zip along pretty fast!).

Similarly to the faces you saw, adding a bit of detail to indicate different dress can indicate more inclusivity too (in the case above, the female figure is wearing a sari and maybe a choli).

Your turn

I hope this helps you think about how you might be more inclusive in the way you draw, wherever you draw, and whatever you draw. And I bet you that everyone around you will really appreciate it, too.

Other things worth reading

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3 ways to visualise psychological safety for better team performance

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Think about you and your team at work for a minute. How supportive would you say it is for everyone to speak their mind, try new things, and learn from mistakes? Is it a pretty open, encouraging team, or is it rife with politics? Do you feel like you can be yourself there?

This is what psychological safety is all about: having a culture where you and your team can bring your whole selves to work, speak your mind with respect for each other, trust each other, be curious, be assured that it’s okay to try new things, and not be penalised speaking out, or for taking small risks. Psychological safety is essential if an organisation wants to have a culture where inventing and implementing breakthrough ideas can thrive.

Using sketching to promote and embed psychological safety

That sounds like a pretty good culture to work in, doesn’t it? So how can you promote and embed that sort of culture? By using more sketching and visualising in your team, of course! Here are 3 ideas to get you going.

1. Draw project ‘horror movie’ posters

I’m a big fan of awesome movie posters, as well as pre-mortem activities, where a team can discuss what they think could go wrong in a project at the beginning of the project, and then discuss what they can do to avoid those things. This is a great way for everyone to be more real with each other, air those anxieties, and be more connected by realising that everyone probably feels the same anxieties.

At the beginning of a project as part of a kick-off meeting, ask everyone to imagine (in silence) the project as a horror movie or disaster movie, where everything they think could go wrong HAS gone wrong. Then, give everyone a sheet of paper and a pencil or marker, and ask them to each draw a promo poster for that movie, showing what has gone wrong.

The drawing doesn’t have to be good at all; just enough to get their idea across. And like all visualisations, just getting those vague thoughts out of people’s heads and out in the open can be really clarifying. You can put everyone at ease by showing them a rough drawing you’ve done yourself, earlier.

Once everyone has finished (after 5 or so minutes), get everyone to stick them up on the wall, and let everyone tell each other about what they’ve drawn. Then, discuss as a team how to avoid those things going wrong. It’s fun, it’s really revealing, and it bonds the team a bit closer together.

2. Do a ‘Circle of expectations’ sketch

Another good activity to do during a project kick-off, or whenever someone new starts on the team, is to do a ‘Circle of expectations’ sketch. Draw a big circle on a whiteboard, and write ‘IN’ in it. Outside the circle on one side, write ‘OUT’.

Set the scene by saying that everyone has a part to play in the culture of the team, and this is the opportunity to state what behaviour expectations we all have. It’s a good idea to demonstrate what you’d like everyone else to do, so go ahead and write something like ‘WE DO THE TASKS WE SAY WE’LL DO’ inside the circle.

Ask everyone to grab a whiteboard marker and write what behaviour they think everyone should have in the team inside the circle. And then ask everyone to write what they don’t want outside the circle.

Discuss as a group how to make sure that everyone does what is inside the circle, and avoid what’s outside the circle. This is a great way to foster honesty, and having each others’ backs.

3. Draw a superhero drawing of yourself

This is a fun and very insightful 15-minute ice-breaker activity to do with your team. Ask everyone to draw a simple outline of a superhero on a sheet of paper (you can use something like the image below as a template if you want).

  • Ask everyone to imagine themselves as a superhero, and then write or draw their own SUPER POWERS around the outline. It’s totally fine to be a bit silly with this; it gives people a chance to get past any awkwardness about drawing and sharing this sort of stuff.
  • Then, ask people to write or draw what they really value inside the outline; this is the POWER SOURCE of you as a superhero. You might want to drop hints by including things like authenticity, honesty… things that reveal what really motivates you.
  • Thirdly, ask everyone to write or draw their KRYPTONITE, the things that make you anxious, annoyed…the things that sap your mojo.

As with all of these activities, get everyone to talk through what they’ve drawn, and discuss as a group how you can support each other to stay connected to your power sources, use your super powers to help each other, and avoid the kryptonites.

Your turn

The only way these activities will bring better psychological safety to your team is for you to actually do them. Maybe try them alone first to get the hang of them, and then do them with your team. I’ve used these over and over again, I’ve seen them bring great benefit to teams, and I guarantee you that they will improve your team’s psychological safety too.

So if you do try any of these activities with your team, let me know, send me a photo… it’d be great to hear how they’ve worked for you!

5 easy ways to give your sketches more WOW factor

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Have you been working away on improving your sketching, and looking for ways to up your game a little? If that’s the case, grab a marker and some paper, and try these 5 easy ways to add more life and character to your sketches. Actually, it’s more like 5.5 ways… You’ll see…

1. Add a dash of detail that tells a story

Surprise is always a great trick to help embed your message or idea deeper into your viewers’ brains. Push your powers of imagination a little further, and add something fresh and unexpected to an otherwise regular icon to enhance the meaning, or hint at a story.

2. Make it move

Sketching things that look like they’re moving always adds energy. What would the thing you’re sketching look like if it were stretching, or bouncing? Wiggling, or racing ahead at break-neck pace?

3. Excite the eyes with some EXAGGERATION!

Whatever you’re sketching, think: what could I exaggerate to add more interest? Think about the relative size of some parts, or the pose of a figure, or even the texture of an object.

4. Snazz it up with a splash of colour

Any sketch is going to be more eye-catching with a splash of colour. You don’t have to go overboard; even just one colour can turn a humble hat from “ho-hum” to “HUZZAH!”

It’s worth paying attention to the way you apply the colour: strong decisive areas and lines are much more visually appealing than thin scratchy marks.

And here’s the bonus half a tip: dial up the contrast with areas of black, or dark colour. Our eyes are drawn to areas of high contrast; if you’re sketching in black, don’t be afraid of using strong areas of black. This will really make your sketches more eye-catching.

5. Put a face on it

Ever since I saw that Portlandia episode, I’ve always remembered that phrase “Put a bird on it!”. Just like putting a picture of a bird on any objet de home décor makes it more hipster, putting a face on any inanimate object instantly adds charm and character.

Here’s the magic: we can’t help seeing faces in things, and as soon as we see a face on something, we can’t help but attribute a personality to it, depending on the face’s expression. So, make your sketches and whiteboard drawings instantly more fun, attention-grabbing and memorable with faces!

Try these tricks out today. The more you bring life, story and character to your sketches, the more people will take notice of them, and the more they’ll remember them, and therefore the more they’ll remember your message and your ideas.

Have fun with it, and don’t be shy about letting me know how you went with applying these tips.