MCB: How to develop visual communications materials in-house or through in-kind contributions in a cost and time effective way

19.12.2025

The Workshop on How to develop visual communications materials in-house
or through in-kind contributions in a cost and time effective way part of EMSP’s Membership Capacity Building (MCB) Programme, was held in 2020. It brought together representatives from various EMSP member organisations to share experiences and best practices. In this article, you can explore the main outcomes of the workshop.

Objectives

1. To strengthen the capacity of EMSP members to continue delivering their work effectively in a changing environment.

2. To provide practical skills in visual communication, including how to create engaging visuals using free or low-cost software and apps.

3. To explore ways to collaborate with external partners, such as agencies, on a pro bono basis to enhance communication outputs.

4. To enable members to communicate their work more effectively, using visuals to engage audiences and support their organisational goals.

Setting the scene: visual communications impact for MS societies. Why is it relevant to shift towards more visual communications?

Catherine Raynor set the scene for the workshop by providing some overview statistics on the impact visuals have on communications. Data she presented pointed to the significant impact visuals have on audience engagement rates, for example followers are 180% more likely to engage with post that include images and 91% of people prefer visual communications over written. The brain is also able to process visuals 60,000 times faster than words and two thirds of us are visuals learners. Further recommended reading for those interested in sources and in finding out more:

• 10 stats that show why 2019 is the year of visual content
• Projecting the future of digital transformation 2018 – 2023, by Cisco (source of 80% of all traffic will be video-based statistic)

After the scene setting slide we went onto to look at some of the data for Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. There are o f course many more social media channels than we could cover in the time we had but for those interested in finding our more about the most popular ones here is a good overview from Adobe.

Using your smartphone to gather and produce content

After the scene-setting section Catherine went on to talk through the basics of content gathering on your smartphone. It was a quick run through of the basic of skills for filming, including lighting, sound, composition and shooting B Roll. Please refer to the accompanying smartphone filmmaking handbook which you are receiving for free for more in-depth guidance on the key skills.

The editing App that Mile 91 recommends is KineMaster which is free with a watermark or very good value to have the watermark removed. There are many free online tutorials for editing with this App on their YouTube channel.

How to rock non-profit graphic design on a budget

Mate provided an introduction to graphic design and why it is important, followed by a comprehensive overview of the different Apps and software solutions for graphic design and web design. Please refer to the PDF slides alongside this report as they include live links to the different software Mate referred to.