# [[Taking visual book notes - Zsolt's Visual Thinking Workshop]] <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/0000000" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe> ## Pre-production ### Thumbnail ![[Taking visual book notes - Zsolt's Visual Thinking Workshop.png]] ![[Taking visual book notes - Zsolt's Visual Thinking Workshop -v2.png]] ### Title 1. emergence book review (78) 2. visual thinking workshop (65) 3. ==taking visual book notes (100)== ### Hook The term "ant queen" is misleading because "queen" implies that she is the leader of an ant colony, when in fact, ants have no leader. Yet they manage to find food, carry objects multiple times their size and weight, and defend the hive when necessary. But if the queen's not giving them instructions, then who is? It turns out... no one. I recently signed up for the Visual Thinking Workshop by Zsolt Viczián. If that name sounds familiar, he is the developer behind the Obsidian Excalidraw and ExcaliBrain plugins. In this pilot cohort-based workshop, we've picked a book-- Emergence, by Steven Johnson -- and we're going to be turning it into a single *visual* representation of all its major ideas: what Zsolt calls "Book on a Page". In this video, I'm taking you with me as I, a not-very-visual person who can't draw, attempt to follow along. 😅 ### Structure - Tools to read the book: Kindle, Readwise, Readwise Official - Thoughts after reading the book - Looking at the highlights in Obsidian - Zsolt uses a modified version of Progressive Summarization, but I find that process unnecessarily rigid, so I'm just going to go with the essentials: - Usually we distill ideas into notes in text form and then combine them into new, composite ideas. - ![[taking visual book notes - text]] - We can also do the same thing, but with visuals and drawings: we can create composable visuals that we put together in interesting ways. - ![[Taking visual book notes - visuals]] - That's what I'm planning to do with Emergence, but planning is one thing and actually doing it is another. - Create separate summary note for Emergence and start identifying themes (text). - Show off [[book]] within the Patreon vault and mention that Patreons have access to it already. - Create atomic visuals to accompany text. ### Outro If you're thinking that this is a lot of work, that's because it is. And *because* it's a lot of work, I wouldn't expect to do it for every single book that I read. Processing my notes on this book took way longer than reading the book in the first place, and that's by design. But it's not the creation of the visuals that's hard, or the typing of text. It's the *thinking* that's hard, and I think THAT is a good sign that I'm learning. [Here's another video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Bbj7xYj3Bc) I made on how I determine how much time and effort I want to spend processing a note. Thanks to Zsolt Viczián for having me in the Visual Thinking Workshop and thank YOU for watching! *Manigong bagong taon!* ### Related videos and resources How real people process notes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Bbj7xYj3Bc How I learn in Obsidian - Keeping up with tech trends: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6kzsCBKCl94 ### Pinned comment ``` ``` ### Timestamps 0:00 Intro ## Post-production - [ ] Create captions using Rev, then edit them. - [ ] Take a thumbnail photo and create one for YouTube (1280 x 720). - [ ] Add description. - [ ] Include the title and any keywords in the first few sentences, but in a natural way. - [ ] Add related videos and resources as links. - [ ] Add end screen. - [ ] Add cards if necessary. - [ ] 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.