PowerPoint slides are often the currency exchanged between subject matter experts and instructional designers and developers. The slides are almost guaranteed to come with a poor design. You will … [Read more...]
The Art Of Writing Great Voice Over Scripts
Remember all those essays and reports you wrote in school? They were written for a teacher to silently read. They were rarely read aloud. Fast forward to the world of work where you are responsible … [Read more...]
How to Improve Your Visual Design Skills
(for Learning Professionals)
As a learning professional, if you haven't focused on or studied visual design it may seem like a mysterious process. How can you ever improve when you don't understand what it entails? I teach visual … [Read more...]
15 Sources for Free Stock Videos
Using Free Stock Video Clips Let's get on with the bad news first. Free stock videos are most likely not going to provide the instructional content you need. And if you are looking for footage of … [Read more...]
How To Design A Quick Reference Card
A Case Study
You've probably used a quick reference card or sheet for easy access to a condensed set of information, like grammar rules, foreign language expressions, software functions and similar types of … [Read more...]
8 Ways To Choose A Color Palette For eLearning
One of the most frustrating aspects of designing an eLearning course is choosing the color palette. The color palette refers to the limited and predefined set of colors you use in a design. If we … [Read more...]
21 Ways to Improve Your Infographics
In his book, The Functional Art, Alberto Cairo writes, "The first and main goal of any graphic and visualization is to be a tool for your eyes and brain to perceive what lies beyond their natural … [Read more...]
How To Plan A Photo Shoot For eLearning
Organizing and managing a successful photo shoot for eLearning is more complicated than you might think. You have to organize by location, have the right props on hand, keep things moving at a steady … [Read more...]
How to Crop Photos for eLearning
Cropping an image is a powerful technique of visual design that you may be under utilizing. It's more than just making a photograph fit your space. Cropping refers to the practice of removing portions … [Read more...]
Audio Recording on a Budget
Adding instructionally sound narration to an eLearning course can improve its quality. Audio is known to provide another way for learners to gain information. When the audio is long and drawn-out, … [Read more...]
Realistic Graphics and Learning: What’s most effective?
Before you just place any old photo into an online course or informational web site, it's a good idea to think about whether a realistic graphic will be effective. And if so, how much realism is … [Read more...]
What Learning Professionals Should Know About Color
Do your graphic designers speak in a secret language? Do you wish you could let terms like hue, saturation and value roll off your tongue? … [Read more...]