Think in Colour

When we talk about visual thinking, it can be easy to become to enamoured with the ‘visual’ part - the output - which, while very important, is really only the artefact of the ‘thinking’ part.

The process of visual thinking asks you to break an idea down into components and rebuild them in new ways, gaining clarity and perspective with each iteration.

That’s where the true magic is found ✨

Making the complex, simple.
The abstract, tangible.
The ordinary, extraordinary.

☎️ Calling local Melbourne illustrators! We are on the hunt for a casual Illustration Assistant to join our little gang. 🕵️‍♀️

Link to position description in bio! 💛

Next Tuesday May 7th at 6pm AEST join us for a peek behind the curtain into the Vivid Learning Academy, followed by a Q&A to answer any burning questions you might have. 🔥✨

Pop it in your diary now! Link in bio! 💛

HOLY SNAPPING TURTLES as my Dad would say 🐢 (no I dunno what it means either but it lives rent free in my head along with all his other Dad-isms 😂).

Vivid Learning Academy is launching THIS TUESDAY APRIL 30! 🚀✨

Tune in at 10am for a guided tour with .gee for a special peek behind the curtain.

We are so proud of this, and can’t wait to get it out in the world. 🥹💛✨

A fresh new platform deserves a fresh new look! ✨

I’m SUPER EXCITED to introduce Vivid Learning Academy, Think in Colour ‘s new virtual learning platform for schools, educators and learners ready to drop next weeeeeeek! 🙀

A comprehensive course that can be delivered in classrooms, groups or self-directed learning to share all my secrets from 14 years of understanding and bringing ideas to life with visual thinking techniques, tailored specifically for study and note-taking.

I’ve been working my little 🍑 off on this and I can’t believe it’s almost ALIIIIIIIVE! 🥹

Next Tuesday April 2 Think in Colour will be hosting the first in our series of mini-workshops in visual thinking for note-taking and study. 🥳

This first session is a crash course in the science behind why visuals are so incredibly effective as a tool for engagement, comprehension and memory retention, and will introduce you to your visual thinking toolkit (spoiler: there’s heaps you can do to leverage the power of visuals without even drawing a picture!).

Grab a sanga and a coffee and join us on Zoom at 12pm AEST to start changing the way you think about processing and communicating information in a way that STICKS. 💛

$35+bf. Register now! x

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/861204234047?aff=ebdsshios

Intro to Visual Thinking: Your Visual Toolkit Learn the basic elements and principles of visual thinking to start building your toolkit for learning, study and note-taking.

As school returns to full swing, I wanted to let the world know about some plans we’ve had burning on the ol’ cooker for a while now...

We have been busy little bees over here at Think in Colour creating some incredible offerings in visual thinking for study skills and note-taking, designed especially for schools. 🌈✨

Over the course of many years, we’ve been lucky enough to work in collaboration with amazing schools like Woodleigh School, New Roads School, and Camberwell Girls Grammar School to name a few.

In 2024, we’re bringing you a suite of workshops, online learning and learning resources that I believe will make a real difference to students trying to navigate how to learn, understand and retain information in today’s world.

Interested? Hit us up! 💛

TEAM PROFILE: James Goh ✨


About James
Meet James, graphic designer, illustrator, product designer and everything in-between! He likes to think of himself as a creative jack-of-all-trades and has found an unique niche of combining his playful illustrate style with his graphic designer skillset.

Whether he is crafting a visual identity for a new brand or illustrations for a new commission, James approaches each project with a sense of playfulness and a dash of whimsy.

He has had the pleasure of working with a variety of local brands, amassing a portfolio that is as diverse as it is fun. His portfolio consists of everything from eye-catching logos and menus for local brunch eateries to creating vibrant illustrations for children’s books, showcasing his versatility and ability to adapt to different creative challenges.

His illustrations combine simple flat geometric silhouettes with bold san-serif typography, resulting in a visually clean but playful energetic aesthetic. A key characteristic of his style is the use of color, where each piece of work has a bright warm colorful palette working in harmony to string together a strong visual narrative.

Signature Style
Colourful and vibrant with a dash of whimsy.

Services
Illustration, motion graphics, graphic design, infographics.

TEAM PROFILE: Arran McKenna ✨


About Arran
Arran McKenna is Canberra-based creative with over 15 years professional experience specialising in Graphic Recording, Illustration and Animation. He’s here to help you visualise your ideas, help untangle your complex problems and tell the story you need to tell in a clear, concise and visually appealing way combined with 5 years experience in collaborative design in the MG Taylor methodology to help bring clarity and alignment to your journey. With Arran you get the whole package – an attentive, empathetic listener with the ability to translate complex ideas and problems into easily digestible nuggets of wisdom. A skilled illustrator with a curious passion for exploration and a playful sense of humour. An accomplished actor who is not afraid of public speaking and facilitation. Strategic roadmaps, Graphic recording talks and panels, Storyboarding your journey, Animated info graphics – it’s all within the wheelhouse. He works with the firm belief that if you cannot have fun with a problem then you’ll never solve it.

Signature Style
Playful, fun and accessible.

Services
Illustration, motion graphics, graphic recording, illustration for video, infographics, comics.

TEAM PROFILE: Meg Kolac ✨


About Meg
Meg Kolac is a Melbourne-based illustrator, designer and lover of all things bold, lively and radiating humanity. Those she works with know her for the sense of energy, joy and vibrancy she weaves through the heart of her designs. She relishes the opportunity to pour pure, delirious, melancholic joy into her work to invigorate people’s experience of art and design. A dreamy thinker and messy do-er, she’s a pom-pom-toting champion for all things beautiful and humbly human.

Signature Style
United by its cracking sense of energy, Meg’s styles range from bold and punchy to elegant, sophisticated and tear-jerkingly sweet. She creates artworks that radiate life into daily moments, capturing the essence and emotion of everything that makes us human.

Services
Illustration, graphic design, infographics, murals.

Hand-drawn scribe videos are perfect for communicating complex ideas in a simple, attractive and accessible format that will get your message across to a broad audience. From frontline staff to senior leaders – who doesn’t love a bloody video?

Tweets with video see 10x more engagement than those without, LinkedIn users are 20x more likely to share a video on the platform than any other type of post, and reels generate more engagement than any other content type on Instagram.

Comment ‘video’ for more info on how we create sweet sweet videos that your audience / employees / clients will 😍.

TEAM PROFILE: Louis Majiwa ✨


About Louis (silent ‘s’)
Working as an animator in Melbourne for the past 5 years, Louis has learned to create a flexible storytelling process to allow for ease in collaboration.
He’s passionate about using illustration, animation and video to help distill complex information into easy to digest stories that spark meaningful connections.

Signature Style
Character driven and illustrative.

Services
Illustration, motion graphics, graphic design, infographics.

Human beings are visually wired. We can get the sense of a visual scene in less than 1/10 of a second. It only takes 150 milliseconds for a symbol to be processed, and 100 milliseconds to attach meaning to it.

Using imagery is a powerful way to help visualise strategy and structure, history and context, important content and data, or the journey ahead – and communicate it in an accessible, engaging and shareable way.

Think in Colour works closely with our clients to create explainer illustrations, journey maps, infographics, strategies on a page, business plans on a page, models and more.

What’s the difference between illustrations / infographics and graphic recording?

Illustrations are created in the studio from a brief, whereas graphic recording is the live illustration of content captured in real-time at workshops, conferences and presentations.

TEAM PROFILE: Beth Parow ✨


About Beth
Beth is an illustrator and graphic designer based in Melbourne. She’s passionate about cartoons, dogs and bright colours!

Signature Style
Cute, colourful and cartoony!

Services
Illustration, motion graphics, graphic design, infographics

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✨WORKSHOP ALERT✨

If I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard “I can’t even draw a stick figure!”, I’d be on a beach somewhere sipping a pina colada right now.

But here’s the secret – yeah you can. Of course you can.

Stick Figure School has been developed to help anyone – even you – ESPECIALLY you, to draw simple, expressive, sophisticated stick figure characters with ease.

Whether you’ve never drawn a line before, you’ve just started out, returning to drawing OR even an experienced illustrator who struggles with characterisation – Stick Figure School is for you. Because yeah, you can.

10am - 11.30am AEDT Dec 5.
Link to book in bio. Get in quick, they’re already selling like hotcakes! X

Tailored visual conference solutions can be used to give your event a visual identity, connect delegates, collect thoughts and feedback, and visually reflect content and the journey of an event.

Live murals, interactive activations, collaborative artworks - so much room for activities! 😍

What have you seen work? What would a dream-wow-omg experience look like? Tell us! 👇

TEAM PROFILE: Gillian Goerz ✨


About Gillian
Gillian Goerz (pronounced “Jillian Gertz”) is a cartoonist, writer, graphic recorder, and illustrator. Her work has been seen in the New York Times, the Walrus, The Globe and Mail, and her clients include Audi, Volkswagen, Pizza Hut and more. Gillian has a passion for communication, and sharing ideas and stories through multiple mediums. Her first kids graphic novel Shirley and Jamila Save Their Summer (Dial) spent 7 weeks on the Canadian Best Seller list, received starred reviews from Kirkus and Publisher’s Weekly, and was reviewed in the New York Times Book Review. The sequel Shirley & Jamila’s Big Fall (Dial, Dec, 2021) was awarded the Doug Wright award for excellence in Canadian Kids Comics. Gillian delights in working with clients to better communicate through visuals, whether that is illustration, video, or live graphic recording. She is always open to finding new ways of working together and bringing visual language, typography and engagement to any situation or environment. Gillian has worked with voice-over artists, animators and editors to create illustrated videos that allow organizations and companies to excite, educate and train their audience, whether that’s their clientele, volunteers or employees. Contact Gillian today to find out how you can work together to bring your ideas to visual life.

Signature Style
Personable, funny, clean and accessible with comic book and typographic energy, and a social-justice angle.

Services
Illustration, video illustration, graphic recording, infographics, motion graphics, punch-up / copywriting / content editing.

Graphic recording is the process of visually capturing content, in real time, using a combination of words, shapes, symbols and imagery.

It’s not merely about drawing pretty pictures. Graphic recording is the art of active listening and rapid synthesis. It’s about distilling complex concepts into visual elements that are both easy to understand and impossible to forget. It’s the process of turning abstract ideas into tangible, shareable, and actionable insights.

While it’s often thought of as a new industry, the roots of visual facilitation date back to problem-solving methodologies of the 1970s, and the International Forum of Visual Practitioners was launched in the USA in 1995.

Graphic recording is most commonly used in workshops, conferences and presentations of all sizes (in-person and virtually) as a tool for audience engagement, enhanced comprehension, memory retention, and emotional connection to content.

It is both a process (the act of live drawing and capture of content to aid engagement and facilitation) and a product (the artefact / output that is created and utilised for ongoing communication). It etches ideas into memory, making them more accessible, shareable, and actionable. It turns fleeting moments into lasting knowledge.

People see their ideas and others’ being brought to life in a common visual language – accessible across teams, business units, industries, regions and cultures.

TEAM PROFILE: Jessamy Gee ✨gee

About Jessamy
As one of Australia’s leading Graphic Recorders, Melbourne-based Jessamy Gee has developed a unique skill set in listening, synthesising, capturing and communicating information visually.

She is the Founder and Director of Think in Colour, Founder and former President of Graphic Recorders Australia, author of ‘GR’s Best Mate’ and co-author of ‘The World of Visual Practice’. In 2018, Jessamy was the keynote speaker at the inaugural VizConf Conference in Melbourne. In 2020, she became the first Australian Director to serve on the Board of the International Forum of Visual Practitioners (IFVP). In 2021, Jessamy took over the role of Chapter Host for CreativeMornings Melbourne. In 2022, she launched The Imposter Syndrome Club podcast with co-host Alice Edy, making it to #3 on the Apple Podcasts Philosophy Charts.

Since launching Think in Colour in 2011, Jessamy has become internationally renowned for her work, and has serviced a diverse range of clients all around Australia, New Zealand, Asia, the United States and Europe across the corporate, community, education and government sectors.

Jessamy has captured talks by some of Australia’s leading minds including former President of the Human Rights Commission Gillian Triggs, former Greens leader Bob Brown, advertising personality Todd Sampson, actor Madga Szubanski, academic and presenter Waleed Aly, Chief Scientist Dr Alan Finkel and former Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Christine Nixon, as well as revered international thinkers such as futurist and inventor Ray Kurzweil, and originator of lateral thinking, Edward de Bono.

Signature Style
Expressive, human-centred, emotive, content-rich.

Services
Illustration, video illustration, graphic recording, infographics, speaking and training.

TEAM PROFILE: Emma Rowland ✨


About Emma
Emma Rowland is a Jill of all trades. Creator of interesting things. Professional doodler.
Emma is a Sydney-based artist specialising in hand-drawn elements like live-scribing, hand-painted signage, custom illustration and murals. Emma uses multiple visual methods to fill your spaces, communicate your ideas and broadcast your brand.

She’s inspired by small town hand-painted signs (especially the old, peeling stuff), historical lettering ephemera, Studio Ghibli (so many years of loving you) and nerding-out on typography everywhere.

Signature Style
Clean lines, type-centric, linework.

Services
Graphic recording, illustration, illustration for video, typography, murals.

TEAM PROFILE: Glenn Stephenson ✨co

About Glenn
From crisp and meaningful conversation drivers that capture Community oriented initiatives and gatherings of minds, to loosey-goosey light hearted engagement pieces – Glenn’s work is respectful and culturally considerate at all times.

Glenn has a particular interest and experience in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander/ First Nations work, community/ social uplift initiatives, team building, urban innovation, and environmental issues.

Signature Style
Clean and emotive content capture – themed and scattered with relational icons.

Services
Illustration, video illustration, motion graphics, graphic recording, infographics, murals, immersive spaces.

TEAM PROFILE: Vess B**g ✨


About Vanessa (Vess)
Vess’s work is whimsical, full of life and delight. Specialising in painterly strokes, she creates pieces that filled with charm and have an organic nature to them.

Signature Style
Sweet, whimsical, playful, gentle and painterly.

Services
Illustration, graphic design, infographics, murals, pattern/textile design, product development.

People are 17% more likely to be persuaded by verbal presentations that have accompanying visuals.

When we have an emotional reaction to something - like the ones triggered by certain colours and imagery - our brains also create a mental ‘post-it’ telling us “Hey - this made you feel something… It must be important! Let’s hold onto this one”.

TEAM PROFILE: Alejo Porras ✨


About Alejo
Alejo [pronounced ah-leh-ho] is on a mission to make stories and ideas unforgettable through his drawings. He can make even the most dry topic feel exciting. And he has been doing exactly that for more than 8 years.

Alejo is based out of Atlanta Georgia, and fluent in both English and Spanish.

Fun fact: When he first went to college in Costa Rica his major was biology.

Signature Style
Dynamic, fun and clever.

Services
Illustration, video illustration, graphic recording, infographics, storyboards.

Vision trumps all senses when it comes to memory. Pictures do 3 x better than words in terms of memory recall, and 6 x better when words and pictures are used in combination - like graphic recording and illustrated videos with voiceovers. Powerful! 💪

(Ref: John Medina, Brain Rules)

TEAM PROFILE: Cat Drysdale ✨


About Cat
Based in Melbourne and with a wealth of experience in event facilitation, Cat is an expert in making complex ideas come to life.

Signature Style
Clear, Contextualised and Compelling.

Services
Illustration, graphic design, graphic recording, infographics.

It’s no secret that adding visuals to a presentation or communication piece makes it MUCH more engaging.

Visuals capture and hold attention, and importantly bring an element of FUN - and fun is serious business when it comes to engagement.

Research has found that colour visuals increase our willingness to read by 80%! THAT’S thinking in colour. 🌈

TEAM PROFILE: Julia Chetwood ✨


About Julia
Originally from Melbourne and currently based in Porto, Julia is an illustrator and motion graphic designer. Since studying Communication Design in 2017, Julia has been working across a wide range of mediums, and with an equally wide range of clients – creating illustrations for murals, social media, and exhibitions, as well as animations for explainers, advertisements and events. Julia has worked with Big Brands such as Google and YouTube, as well as smaller new clients just getting off the ground – but the quality of her work and my dedication to create the perfect graphic solution is the same across the board.

Signature Style
Bright, joyful, accessible and approachable. Julia loves to pause on small and simple moments of delight, and her character illustrations always retain their essence of originality and diversity. Julia’s illustrations refine complicated scenes or abstract concepts through shape and colour, distilling references into softer, more dynamic illustrations.

Services
Illustration, infographics, motion graphics, murals, graphic design.

Did you know that we can get the gist of a visual scene in 1/10 of a second? Or that it only takes us 150ms for a symbol to be processed, and 100ms to attach meaning to it?

Visuals aren’t just purdy, they’re incredibly effective at communicating a message quickly and efficiently, drawing on our visually wired brains and our existing understanding of symbols, icons and imagery.