A PHD PROGRAM OF THE FACULTY OF MEDICINE · UNIVERSITY OF BASEL

Visual Communication

Effective Visual Communication of Science

Course description

In this course you will learn to effectively communicate your own scientific ideas and results by applying best visual communication practices to your research communication. You will understand the principles and useful design approaches used by experts. You will get feedback on a selection of your figures, slides and posters submitted ahead of the webinar. In an exercise, you will draw a sketch of your research (a graphical abstract) and discuss it with other participants.

Topics include:

  • Communicating with scientific vs non-scientific audiences
  • Visual perception and what humans find intuitive
  • Layout: a global structure that simplifies comprehension
  • Eye-flow: effortlessly guide the audience through the design
  • Colors: how to amplify, not ‘fancify’
  • Slides that amplify your messages when presenting
  • Posters: strategy and process for creating posters that attract and explain

Learning objectives

  • Distinguishing between communicating with scientific vs non-scientific audiences
  • Describing the principles of visual communication and recognizing them in figures, slides, and posters
  • Applying useful design approaches used by experts (layout, eye-flow, color) to any drawings and sketches
  • Visually present your research message

Lecturer

Dr. Jernej Zupanc holds a PhD (2011) and was a postdoc in computer science. He founded Seyens Ltd and his goal is to help scientists effectively communicate their ideas and results and make an impact with their research.


Participants

University of Basel PhD students of the Faculty of Medicine and of Swiss TPH.


Workload & credits

Total 14 h –> lessons 12 h, preliminary work 2 h

Registration

closed

Minimal Standards

This is a course from the domain ‘Leadership & Personal Competences’. The main competence is ‘Communication skills’.

Dates

2-3 May 2022

Location

Online

This course is offered to the PPHS community by GRACE at the University of Basel.