Kursbeschreibung

Course language: English

Target Group:

Doctoral researchers of all faculties

Trainer:

Sophia Antoniello and Tim Kiessling

2-Day-Seminar:

Tuesday, 14 April 2026, 02:00 p.m. - 06:00 p.m.

Getting to know each other’s research in a visual way; practical introduction to Inkscape: basics and creating simple graphics; group exercise on focusing on one visual message to communicate

Wednesday, 15 April 2026, 02:00 p.m. - 06:00 p.m.

Theory session on licensing, copyright and online resources; practical Inkscape work session: vectorization of hand drawn images and working on a graphic for visual science communication; creative work session (science outreach postcard, graphic recording input, or trying out tools and pencils)

Participants will be asked: To bring their own laptop, ideally also a mouse, and to install the open access program Inkscape before the workshop, available here

Content:

Graphics and visualisations are an important communication tool in science, for example as figures in scientific articles, as part of posters and presentations or for effectively communicating your research to the general public or on social media. In this workshop you will learn how to synthesize and simplify your research processes and products into visually appealing graphics. We will primarily focus on visualisations for audiences not involved in your field of research but the methods will also help you to develop figures for journal articles and graphical abstracts of your research work (for communication with fellow researchers). One focus will also be the design and thought process of creating these graphics (meaning the mental process of summarising and potentially simplifying your research). We will also address topics such as licensing and copyright of graphics and online resources and available tools that facilitate visual research work. Finally, you will have the chance to create a postcard as one piece of outreach work that you can sent to colleagues, friends or family. Most of the practical work will be conducted with the free and open access software Inkscape, a powerful vector-based graphics program.

The participation in this course is accountable for the certificate “Science Communication” of the Graduate Center. Please contact Mirco Bergerhof if you are interested.

Registration:

Our courses are avilable via the booking portal of Kiel University's Continuing Professional Development Center. You will find them listed under the category  Exclusively for Doctoral Researchers. Courses within this category are part of the Graduate Center's qualification program. They are free of charge for doctoral researchers who are registered with the Graduate Center. To get access to these courses you must be register with the Graduate Center, here.

Registrations are welcome until 29 March 2026. We will then determine whether the minimum number of 10 participants has been reached. Should the minimum number of participants not have been reached, the event will not take place due to financial reasons. Once the minimum number of participants has been reached, further registrations are possible until 8 days before the event begins.

Organizational details:

•    As a general rule, we expect you to participate in our online events with the camera switched on. Please comply with the request of the trainers and/or lecturers if they remind you to do so.
•    Please note the data protection statement of the Graduate Center.
•    Please find information at the website of the Graduate Center for registration, waiting list and de-registration.
•    Please find information at the website of the Graduate Center for sanctions.
•    In order to book courses through booking portal of Kiel University's Continuing Professional Development Center, you will need to create a personal account. Once you have done so, you can use this account to register for the Graduate Center’s courses. This offers two main advantages:

1.    In addition to the Exclusively for Doctoral Researchers category, you will also have access to the full range of courses offered by the Continuing Professional Development Center and you can explore whether they might be of interest to you.
2.    You will have a consolidated record of all courses you have attended in one place.