# [[Brilliant December - Visual atomic note taking with Obsidian Excalidraw]] <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/GqrczIftYyA" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe> ## Pre-production ### Thumbnail ~~atomic~~ composable notes ![[Brilliant December - Visual atomic note taking with Obsidian Excalidraw - v2.png]] ![[Brilliant December - Visual atomic note taking with Obsidian Excalidraw.png]] ### Title 1. drawing in obsidian (69) 2. images in obsidian (59) 3. visual notes in obsidian (58) 4. atomic note taking (87) 5. ==visual atomic note taking (100)== ### Hook The concept of an atomic note may have been popularised by the Zettelkasten movement and other similar methodologies, but you don't have to follow any of that to see the value in the principle of atomicity: the idea that simplifying something down to its parts makes each part more reusable in different contexts. We have many names for this in tech, but I like the word *composable*. But "composable" is not JUST about being ABLE to separate everything into smaller parts. A composable system is one where you can choose the BEST part for every purpose and STILL have them all play well together. I like to think of my Obsidian vault as a composable system. In this video, I'm going to talk about what you can do to create and maintain visual notes along with your textual notes so that you can choose the best type of note for the job. ### Structure - I'm still exploring how to make my vault more visual, and here's what I've come up with. - There are many ways you can create and store images in Obsidian, but the best way I've found is Excalidraw. - If you just use images, you can't tag, add metadata to, and transclude parts of them. You can do this in Excalidraw. - Create your own Excalidraw folder. I like to do this so that I can potentially have two versions of the same idea: one in text, one in visuals. - Excalidraw creates: `.excalidraw`, `.svg`, `png`. - Which one to use? `.excalidraw` is the one that you can add frontmatter to, so that's the best suited for a composable note-taking system. However, `.svg` is more modifiable as an image and `.png` is more portable in case you want those images to be published online too. - Next time you're processing your notes, think about whether you could create a visual in Excalidraw in addition to text about that topic. > [!NOTE] Brilliant sponsored section > I want to show a real example here, so I'm going to pick up something I learned from a Brilliant lesson and then I'm going to try creating both a note about it in text AND a visual drawing. > > Brilliant is the sponsor of this part of the video, but it also is convenient for demos because each lesson is pretty short and, well, composable. Brilliant is an online learning platform specifically geared towards maths and sciences, so it's close to my heart. (`brilliant-crypto.mov`) This one about cryptocurrency talks about some of the requirements for any currency that I feel are really foundational ideas, so I'm going to click the Readwise Reader browser extension and then start highlighting and taking notes here. > > I don't always get a chance to use Brilliant EVERY day, but I still find myself using it several times a week because it's just fun. Scrolling through their new courses makes me feel better than scrolling through social media feeds, and it's so tempting to try out new ones I see, like this Crypto one. They're doing great work in bringing sometimes quite complicated mathematical topics down to simple, practical terms, and I think it's work that should be supported. > > If you'd like to try it out, go to brilliant.org/nicolevdh to sign up for a free trial, and then the first 200 people on there will get a 20% discount off an annual subscription. Thanks for supporting an awesome company, AND thanks for supporting me as well. :) - Now let's see what that Brilliant note looks like in Obsidian! - Show note in Obsidian - Create a [[Cryptocurrency]] or Currency note - Create an Excalidraw drawing of the different requirements for currency. - Library vs. separate .excalidraw: which one is better for atomic notes? .excalidraw - Linking to an Excalidraw drawing. - Just like linking to a textual note. - Backlinks (linked mentions) exist for it too! - Tagging and metadata in a drawing - Switching to Markdown view. - Works in ExcaliBrain. - Embedding from Excalidraw: - Text from a drawing (since the drawing is converted to text). - OCR! - Area from a drawing - Group from a drawing - Show final note. ### Outro I don't think I'm ever going to be a person who can make ALL her notes visual. If that's you, go with the gods! I think I learn best when I have SOME visuals that describe core ideas, and then text to go along with it and explain nuances. Recent developments in Obsidian Excalidraw by its developer, Zsolt Viczián, really make it possible to create a hybrid vault like this, which just opens up a lot of possibilities for how I think and learn. If you'd like to learn more about the Obsidian Excalidraw plugin, check out this video where I go more into the basics of how to use it. Thanks for watching! *Terima kasih!* ### Related videos and resources Image references in Obsidian Excalidraw: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZQoJg2RCKI Flaticon: https://www.flaticon.com/ The Noun Project: https://thenounproject.com/ ### Pinned comment ``` Visit https://brilliant.org/nicolevdh to get started learning STEM for free, and the first 200 people will get 20% off their annual premium subscription. THEMES USED: Minimal (light) PLUGINS MENTIONED: Obsidian Excalidraw, ExcaliBrain, Dataview ``` ### Timestamps 00:00 Intro 00:57 Why Obsidian Excalidraw 01:56 Create an Excalidraw folder 04:18 Getting something into Obsidian 06:44 Creating visuals in Excalidraw 11:58 Links and backlinks for visuals 13:02 Adding tags and metadata to images 16:38 Embedding drawings and parts of drawings ## Post-production - [x] Create captions using Rev, then edit them. - [x] Take a thumbnail photo and create one for YouTube (1280 x 720). - [x] Add description. - [x] Include the title and any keywords in the first few sentences, but in a natural way. - [x] Add related videos and resources as links. - [x] Add end screen. - [ ] Add cards if necessary. - [x] Add chapters/timestamps for YouTube if longer than 5 minutes. - [ ] Add mid-roll ads/check monetization settings. - [ ] Post video preview on Patreon. - [ ] Post video preview for YouTube channel members. - [ ] Schedule on YouTube. - [ ] Add video to relevant playlist(s), or create a playlist if necessary. - [ ] Promote on Twitter/LinkedIn as appropriate. - [ ] Create a blog post on [site](https://nicolevanderhoeven.com). - [ ] Add to weekly newsletter. - [ ] Add to video-database. - [ ] Add to other notes in my vault as appropriate.