EyeWorld is the official news magazine of the American Society of Cataract & Refractive Surgery.
Issue link: https://digital.eyeworld.org/i/194331
90 EW International October 2013 International outlook The art of seeing eye-to-eye by Matt Young EyeWorld Contributing Writer H as PowerPoint become passé? Perhaps the question itself is symptomatic of the information overload we endure every day. We have become so used to enhanced graphics, embedded high-definition video clips, and animations that at times the message is lost in the telling. It is all too easy to let production value substitute for content. A thoughtful audience can readily judge the merit of a simply stated concept. A sophisticated audience can sometimes be distracted by slick graphic design. We need to keep in mind that the best ideas require only pen and paper to convey. John A. Vukich, MD, international editor Watch this video on your smartphone or iPad using your QR code reader. (Scanner available for free at your app store.) A ttend any ophthalmology symposium and if it weren't for compelling pearls of wisdom, you might be bored to death by the use of Microsoft PowerPoint. Without a doubt, many presentations still rely on PowerPoint to convey important messages about new technology and recent study data. Ophthalmologists are excellent at conveying information with precision—the same precision that gets them through surgery day-in and day-out. But often, they are not quite as proficient in connecting with other ophthalmologists or with patients in engaging dialogue. In 2008, author Dan Roam simplified the art of the presentation in his book The Back of the Napkin, in which he explained how drawing in that precise location in front of an audience can be more powerful than a high-tech graphical display of slides. How successful was Mr. Roam's essential message? His visual explanation of American healthcare was chosen by Businessweek as "The World's Best Presentation of 2009." Interestingly—though perhaps not so surprisingly—this, according to Mr. Roam, prompted the White House Office of Communications to invite him in for discussions on visual problem solving. Again, that was 2009. Fast forward to today. What's happening with visual communication now, especially in ophthalmology? A new take on an old element If the napkin—in other words paper—became hot again in 2008 as the sine qua non of presentation, you might be surprised to learn that an even older tool is a hit today— sand. More like sand animation, to be precise. The Wikipedia entry on sand animation, in which "animators move around sand on a backlighted or frontlighted piece of glass to create each frame for their animated films," notes the popular appeal of such media. Kseniya Simonova won "Ukrain's Got Talent 2009," Joe Castillo was a top 5 finalist in 2012 in "America's Got Talent Season 7," and Vina Candrawati was runner up A Jakarta Eye Center sand animation video shows the artist's hand at work depicting the eye. In the same video, the artist's hand transforms an eye into a brain while explaining that the eye is the second most important organ in the body after the brain. Source (all): John A. Hutauruk, MD in 2013 in "Indonesia Mencari Bakat 3" or "Indonesia's Looking for Talent 3." They are all sand animation artists, and at least 18 such artists in all have made strong appearances in televised talent competitions globally. Clearly, this medium is connecting with people internationally, and Johan A. Hutauruk, MD, director, Jakarta Eye Center, Jakarta, Indonesia, has taken note. Dr. Hutauruk recently spearheaded the effort to develop a sand animation that explains the concept of wavefront to patients. "PowerPoint is not entertaining," Dr. Hutauruk said. "This is why I came up with the idea of 'Wavefront in the Sand' [the title of Dr. Hutauruk's explanatory video]." The video, which was presented this year at the APACRS Film Festival in Singapore, has none of the bells and whistles of PowerPoint or even a TV video, but it does have an engaging artist's touch. "Sometimes patients don't pay attention to what I am showing them on TV," Dr. Hutauruk said. "But using the sand animation that I put in the waiting room, patients pay attention. They find it attractive, wondering, 'How can someone make pictures with the sand?' They say it is an amazing video." An artist simply shifts sand around with his or her fingers in order to create different pictures that taken together form the animation. It's probably a lot more complicated than that to create, but all that