EuroVis is currently taking place in Barcelona. In the interest of shorter postings, I’m breaking this report up into three parts. This first part covers the EuroRVVV workshop as well as the opening session and keynote. [Read more...] about EuroVis 2017 Conference Report, Part 1
Paper: An Argument Structure for Data Stories
There is talk about stories having a beginning, middle, and end, but what does that mean for data stories? How do you create the overall structure for those? In a paper to be presented at EuroVis next week, I discuss a simple but very useful structure that I have found "in the wild," and that I believe to be useful and generalizable.
[Read more...] about Paper: An Argument Structure for Data Stories
Paper: Readability and Precision in Pictorial Bar Charts
Embellished charts are common in information graphics. But are embellished bar charts actually harder to read than plain ones? In a short paper to be presented at EuroVis next week, Drew Skau and I present a study that looked into this question. [Read more...] about Paper: Readability and Precision in Pictorial Bar Charts
Paper: Finding a Clear Path: Structuring Strategies for Visualization Sequences
How should you sequence information in a data story so it makes the most sense? Are some sequences better than others? Does time have to move forward or does it not matter? In a paper to be published at EuroVis next week, with Jessica Hullman at UW and my Tableau Research colleague Heidi Lam, we report on a pair of studies that looked into this. [Read more...] about Paper: Finding a Clear Path: Structuring Strategies for Visualization Sequences
InfoVis Papers at CHI 2017
The two main conferences in visualization are VIS and EuroVis, but recently CHI has also gotten some very interesting submissions (CHI is technically a conference about human-computer interaction, or HCI). This year looked particularly strong, [Read more...] about InfoVis Papers at CHI 2017
Linkstravaganza: Schwabish’s Story Links and Andrews’ Seeking Minard
I don't normally do link dumps, but since I'm behind on blogging and have been meaning to link to these things for a while… here are some articles for you to check out. The first set is on what storytelling means with data, the second about an interesting discovery around Charles Minard. [Read more...] about Linkstravaganza: Schwabish’s Story Links and Andrews’ Seeking Minard
Averages Are Metadata
When we think of metadata, we tend to think of attributes that describe the data. Where do the numbers come from? What do the values in a categorical column mean? Etc. But there is a type of metadata we rarely even recognize as such: values computed from the data. They're often treated as part of the data, but that's a mistake. [Read more...] about Averages Are Metadata
Huge Percentages Are Meaningless
Percentages are incredibly useful when talking about how something is a part of something larger: this many percent tax, that many percent of people are unemployed, etc. When percentages are much larger than 100, however, they lose their meaning and their usefulness. Unfortunately, they seem to be increasingly common. [Read more...] about Huge Percentages Are Meaningless
How Do We Know That? – Video of My Talk at UW
I gave a talk at the University of Washington a few weeks ago. This is an extended version of my BELIV paper An Empire Built on Sand from last year, with more examples and a lot more jokes. You'll learn about various things we know and don't know about visualization, and also whether spinach and carrots actually are good for you. [Read more...] about How Do We Know That? – Video of My Talk at UW
ISOTYPE Book: Priestley, British Women Go To War
This is perhaps the oddest book with an ISOTYPE illustration, certainly of the ones I have seen so far. It also contains the most confusing chart produced by the ISOTYPE Institute I am aware of. [Read more...] about ISOTYPE Book: Priestley, British Women Go To War