Skip to main content

Sketchnoting for PKM

I'm exploring ways to take Personal Knowledge Management to the next level. I'm learning to think more visually, integrating Excalidraw into my Obsidian knowledge graph. My drawings have become more than just illustrations. They are self-standing documents, interlinked with everything else in my PKM system.

Sketchnoting for PKM

With the release of the Obsidian-Excalidraw plugin v1.2.0 Sketches have become first-class citizens in Obsidian!

I am exploring the possibilities of Sketchnoting for PKM.

Drawings can become much more than (just) illustrations inserted between paragraphs of text. [[Links]] in sketches can elevate your drawing to navigational hubs (a.k.a. Index Notes) in your vault.

The Stencil-Library offers an ideal place to store your Visual Vocabulary.

The stencil-library

Drawings are great for brainstorming and problem-solving. The slightly slower process of creating visual notes offers more time to reflect and internalize your subject.

I have many ideas to integrate sketchnoting into the PKM workflow, for example by supporting occlusion in drawings to facilitate learning through sketch-based spaced repetition.

Develop your Visual Vocabulary

Because I couldn't even get past the level of drawing stick figures, I have always felt intimidated by friends who could draw well. The idea of developing my visual vocabulary was a game-changer for me.

Visual Vocabulary

Visual Vocabulary for Project Planning

I created a stencil library for project planning. I added hashtags to each icon because, this way, if you add them to your sketch in the Obsidian-Excalidraw plugin, your drawing will be tagged with the relevant keywords. You can download the library from here.

Excalidraw stencil library for Project Planning
Like this post?
Show your support.

Comments

  1. Thank you very much for sharing it Zsolt! A quick question - did you draw the symbols in Developing your visual library picture or downloaded them into Obsidian? I can't find those symbols and drawing with a mouse is nowhere nearly as good. Or maybe you use a graphic pad?

    Thanks!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I draw with a mouse as well. I don’t use freedraw, but rather lines, rectangles, ellipses and diamond… Everything can be constructed from these. You can download my icons from here: https://ko-fi.com/zsolt/shop

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Showcasing Excalidraw

Conor ( @Conaw ) pointed me to Excalidraw last week, and I was blown away by the tool and especially about the opportunities it opens up for  Roam Research ! It is a full-featured, embeddable sketching component ready for web integration. This post will showcase key Excalidraw features and discusses some of the issues I still need to solve to complete its integration into Roam. I spent most of my free time during the week integrating Excalidraw into Roam. This article will introduce Excalidraw by showcasing its features.

Mind mapping with Excalidraw in Obsidian

Mind-mapping is a powerful tool. In this post I will show you how and when I mindmap with Excalidraw in Obsidian and why mindmapping is such a good tool for Personal Knowledge Management. Like this post? Show your support.

Evergreen Note on Note-taking Strategies and Their Practical Implementations

This is an evergreen note that I will be revisit regularly to develop a comprehensive list of note-taking approaches including their practical implementations in various software tools. This post will serve as an elaborate table of contents, including a brief introductory discussion on the importance of note-taking, followed by a high-level walkthrough of each method. Links to posts and videos with detailed examples and descriptions will follow over the coming weeks and months.

TOSCA an Algorithm for Framing Problems

We fail more often because we solve the wrong problem than because we get the wrong solution to the right problem. Russel L. Ackoff In case you were wondering, those are ducks on the table. The facilitator gave us six pieces of LEGOs and asked us to create ducks. You may think this is a well-defined problem. I find it amazing though, how each of us in a group of ten came up with a completely original design. Our unique perspective and our experiences and skills hugely influence our solutions to problems. How we perceive a situation will heavily influence the issues we identify and the solutions we find. If you put one person into a situation, they get stuck. When you put another into the same situation, they solve it in an instant or solve it in a way that you would have never expected. You can frame problems differently leading to unique solutions. Outside school there are rarely problems with an ultimate right solution. To go a step further, there are ra...

contact: info@zsolt.blog