How do you balance aesthetics and helpfulness when creating videos? Diane Elkins, the Co-owner of Artisan E-Learning and E-Learning Uncovered, joins this episode of The Visual Lounge to discuss. Diane is a national e-learning expert. She’s in the business of helping people create courses they can be proud of —and visual aids happen to play a big part. It’s not simply about creating visuals that look great. They also have to be purposeful, offer value, and complement the rest of your content. For the yes’s, maybes, and absolutely-nots of creating visual content that gets the message across, tune in to this episode of The Visual Lounge. Learning points from the episode include: 00:00 - 02:16 Intro 02:17 - 02:58 Diane tells us about herself 02:59 - 04:25  How Diane pivoted from graphic design to training and learning 04:26 - 07:51 The role of visuals in producing good learning material 07:52 - 09:55 Best practices in creating good visuals 09:56 - 13:33 How to pull back with design elements 13:34 - 15:48 The difference between a classroom trainer and an e-learning module 15:49 - 18:56 How much information should accompany visuals 18:57 - 25:42 Different levels to consider when creating visuals 25:43 - 27:33 How visuals can do more harm than good 27:34 - 29:36 A litmus test to check if your content helpful 29:37 - 32:03 Tips to get from analogies to solid visual concepts 32:04 - 32:50 Why the audience is more important than the content 32:51 - 33:29 Overlaps between training and marketing 33:30 - 41:02 Decorating vs illustrating your content 41:03 - 48:49 Diane gives practical tips on how to make visual content more helpful 48:50 - 52:35 Speed round questions 52:36 - 54:54 Diana and Matt chat about editing audio 54:55 - 55:47 How to connect with Diane 55:48 - 56:46 Outro

Important links and mentions: E-Learning Uncovered: https://elearninguncovered.com/ (https://elearninguncovered.com/) Artisan E-Learning: https://artisanelearning.com/ (https://artisanelearning.com)/ Diane’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dpelkins/ (https://www.linkedin.com/in/dpelkins/) When Graphics Lower Learning by Patti Shank: https://elearningindustry.com/when-graphics-lower-learning (https://elearningindustry.com/when-graphics-lower-learning)

Learn more about the https://academy.techsmith.com/?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=visuallounge&utm_content= make-helpful-images (TechSmith Academy). To read the blog post on the topic or watch the video, go to: https://www.techsmith.com/blog/make-helpful-images (https://www.techsmith.com/blog/make-helpful-images)