Gill created a series of workshops, specifically for scientists, that were designed to improve their scientific visual communication in papers, presentations, posters, information sheets, etc. These workshops are delivered either in-person or online and cover both scientific peer-to-peer communication and visual communication with non-scientists. As a former scientist herself, Gill is very aware of the constraints and conventions surrounding the creation and use of scientific figures, etc., and these issues are addressed in the workshops.
The scientific visual communication workshops were developed during Gill’s collaborative work with the Centre for Neuroimaging Sciences at King’s College London and derived directly from her PhD research. She continues to provide both in-person and online workshops for research students of the Health Faculties at KCL, and will be running two series of workshops during the 2025/26 academic year. Gill has previously provided online workshops for other scientific institutions, including the Marine Biological Association, the German Centre for Neurogenerative Diseases (DZNE) and the Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin. Feedback from participants has been very positive, as the comments below show:
“Gill is great – very informative session and it was great to have a perspective from someone who understands both scientific figures and graphic design. Will definitely make me more aware of how I design my figures in the future.”
“Really helpful course that should be part of every PhD’s curriculum.”
“It really helped to see examples of work and how they could be improved by following the tips outlined in the talk.”
Feedback from participants in Gill’s ‘Good Graphic Design Practice’ workshop
“Really helpful hands-on course. Gill was great at helping with questions and demonstrating functions.”
“Organising this workshop was such a great idea! I think it fills an important gap in the training available to PhD students. Without it, it would have taken me forever to get to grips with Adobe Illustrator. Or I would have just stuck with PowerPoint forever …”
“I was unsure as to whether the software would be accessible and sufficiently flexible for my illustrative needs. This session gave me the confidence that I could use it effectively.”
Feedback from participants in the ‘Creating Scientific Figures Using Adobe Illustrator’ workshop
In February 2024 Gill discussed her work in scientific visual communication, and the workshops, with Cathy Harshaw, the then training and events manager at the Marine Biological Association:
Graphical Science 