What is "live drawing"?

Live drawing, scribing, or visual note-taking is an increasingly popular service whereby a specially trained illustrator captures the content of a gathering live, either on a big canvas or digitally. The result is a unique visual summary of the workshop or presentation that engages the audience, both during the event and as a way to remember it afterwards.

During the intake with a client I go over the program's components, and together we determine how the canvas should roughly be populated with this content. Then during the event, the real magic happens: the specific images that appear are primarily inspired by the specific energy the people in the room bring. Afterwards, a digitally cleaned up version is sent out to be forwarded to the attendees, as a thank you and souvenir of the day.

Below are some examples of different live drawing events I had the pleasure of drawing for, from an intimate 20 person roundtable, to a massive 400+ people event.

live|work - Employee Experience Roundtable

Service design studio live|work organized a 'roundtable' evening by and for their network to learn about how to improve the employee experience. It included two presentations and a small workshop afterwards. Thanks to live|work studio for the great photos!

Taking notes while listening to the first presentation.

Drawing out the first presentation while simultaneously listening to and taking notes of the second presentation.

At the end of the event I walked the group through the poster as a recap of the evening.

Participants enjoyed hearing some of their own key quotes back, this time accompanied by an image.

The original poster stayed on the glass wall in live|work's office, and last thing I heard it's still there!

Big thanks to Rosa Storm for the invitation and great collaboration.

Gemeente Utrecht - Twin4Resilience European consortium meeting

Developing "digital twins" of cities and infrastructure has become a promising strategic approach to solving city planning issues. Twin4Resilience is a big international 5 year collaboration funded by the European Union that brings together researchers and industry professionals to bring together various digital twin efforts.

I had the privilege of joining their first international consortium meeting in Amsterdam and visually taking stock of the current status.

Live drawing during one of the break-out sessions. The poster traveled with me while visiting the different groups.

A close-up of the live drawing.

The final poster.

A thank you to Muriël for the lovely collaboration and the nice photos!

The Salvation Army - Leadership event

The Salvation Army in collaboration with Studio26 organized a large event to celebrate 400+ of its leading care professionals, and to look at the future of leadership. This was a very exciting event to be a part of as it included a diverse program of presentations, workshops, music and dance.

The poster came together throughout the day and was referenced at several points, with a final presentation on stage.

A still from the 'after movie', working besides the stage under a spotlight.

Backstage, the canvas in position, ready to be presented to the audience.

The massive poster still looked small on the gigantic stage. This was during the final wrap-up.

The final poster after some digital cleaning up.

Very grateful to Studio26 for the impressive organisation and the great collaboration, and of course to The Salvation Army for the opportunity and very warm welcome!