Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form, or by any means, only with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2015957322
British Library Cataloguing in Publication data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-1-4739-1213-7
ISBN 978-1-4739-1214-4 (pbk)
Editor: Mila Steele
Editorial assistant: Alysha Owen
Production editor: Ian Antcliff
Marketing manager: Sally Ransom
Cover design: Shaun Mercier
Typeset by: C&M Digitals (P) Ltd, Chennai, India
Printed and bound in Great Britain by Bell and Bain Ltd, Glasgow
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Contents List of Figures with Source Notes Acknowledgements About the Author INTRODUCTION PART A FOUNDATIONS
1 Defining Data Visualisation 2 Visualisation Workflow
PART B THE HIDDEN THINKING 3 Formulating Your Brief 4 Working With Data 5 Establishing Your Editorial Thinking
PART C DEVELOPING YOUR DESIGN SOLUTION 6 Data Representation 7 Interactivity 8 Annotation 9 Colour 10 Composition
PART D DEVELOPING YOUR CAPABILITIES 11 Visualisation Literacy
References Index
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List of Figures with Source Notes 1.1 A Definition for Data Visualisation 19 1.2 Per Capita Cheese Consumption in the U.S., by Sarah Slobin (Fortune magazine) 20 1.3 The Three Stages of Understanding 22 1.4–6 Demonstrating the Process of Understanding 24–27 1.7 The Three Principles of Good Visualisation Design 30 1.8 Housing and Home Ownership in the UK, by ONS Digital Content Team 33 1.9 Falling Number of Young Homeowners, by the Daily Mail 33 1.10 Gun Deaths in Florida (Reuters Graphics) 34 1.11 Iraq’s Bloody Toll, by Simon Scarr (South China Morning Post) 34 1.12 Gun Deaths in Florida Redesign, by Peter A. Fedewa (@pfedewa) 35 1.13 If Vienna would be an Apartment, by NZZ (Neue Zürcher Zeitung) [Translated] 45 1.14 Asia Loses Its Sweet Tooth for Chocolate, by Graphics Department (Wall Street Journal) 45 2.1 The Four Stages of the Visualisation Workflow 54 3.1 The ‘Purpose Map’ 76 3.2 Mizzou’s Racial Gap Is Typical On College Campuses, by FiveThirtyEight 77 3.3 Image taken from ‘Wealth Inequality in America’, by YouTube user ‘Politizane’ (www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPKKQnijnsM) 78 3.4 Dimensional Changes in Wood, by Luis Carli (luiscarli.com) 79 3.5 How Y’all, Youse and You Guys Talk, by Josh Katz (The New York Times) 80 3.6 Spotlight on Profitability, by Krisztina Szücs 81 3.7 Countries with the Most Land Neighbours 83 3.8 Buying Power: The Families Funding the 2016 Presidential Election, by Wilson Andrews, Amanda Cox, Alicia DeSantis, Evan Grothjan, Yuliya Parshina-Kottas, Graham Roberts, Derek Watkins and Karen Yourish (The New York Times) 84 3.9 Image taken from ‘Texas Department of Criminal Justice’ Website (www.tdcj.state.tx.us/death_row/dr_executed_offenders.html) 86
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3.10 OECD Better Life Index, by Moritz Stefaner, Dominikus Baur, Raureif GmbH 89 3.11 Losing Ground, by Bob Marshall, The Lens, Brian Jacobs and Al Shaw (ProPublica) 89 3.12 Grape Expectations, by S. Scarr, C. Chan, and F. Foo (Reuters Graphics) 91 3.13 Keywords and Colour Swatch Ideas from Project about Psychotherapy Treatment in the Arctic 92 3.14 An Example of a Concept Sketch, by Giorgia Lupi of Accurat 92 4.1 Example of a Normalised Dataset 99 4.2 Example of a Cross-tabulated Dataset 100 4.3 Graphic Language: The Curse of the CEO, by David Ingold and Keith Collins (Bloomberg Visual Data), Jeff Green (Bloomberg News) 101 4.4 US Presidents by Ethnicity (1789 to 2015) 114 4.5 OECD Better Life Index, by Moritz Stefaner, Dominikus Baur, Raureif GmbH 116 4.6 Spotlight on Profitability, by Krisztina Szücs 117 4.7 Example of ‘Transforming to Convert’ Data 119 4.8 Making Sense of the Known Knowns 123 4.9 What Good Marathons and Bad Investments Have in Common, by Justin Wolfers (The New York Times) 124 5.1 The Fall and Rise of U.S. Inequality, in Two Graphs Source: World Top Incomes Database; Design credit: Quoctrung Bui (NPR) 136 5.2–4 Why Peyton Manning’s Record Will Be Hard to Beat, by Gregor Aisch and Kevin Quealy (The New York Times) 138–140 C.1 Mockup Designs for ‘Poppy Field’, by Valentina D’Efilippo (design); Nicolas Pigelet (code); Data source: The Polynational War Memorial, 2014 (poppyfield.org) 146 6.1 Mapping Records and Variables on to Marks and Attributes 152 6.2 List of Mark Encodings 153 6.3 List of Attribute Encodings 153 6.4 Bloomberg Billionaires, by Bloomberg Visual Data (Design and development), Lina Chen and Anita Rundles (Illustration) 155 6.5 Lionel Messi: Games and Goals for FC Barcelona 156 6.6 Image from the Home page of visualisingdata.com 156 6.7 How the Insane Amount of Rain in Texas Could Turn Rhode Island Into a Lake, by Christopher Ingraham (The Washington Post) 156
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6.8 The 10 Actors with the Most Oscar Nominations but No Wins 161 6.9 The 10 Actors who have Received the Most Oscar Nominations 162 6.10 How Nations Fare in PhDs by Sex Interactive, by Periscopic; Research by Amanda Hobbs; Published in Scientific American 163 6.11 Gender Pay Gap US, by David McCandless, Miriam Quick (Research) and Philippa Thomas (Design) 164 6.12 Who Wins the Stanley Cup of Playoff Beards? by Graphics Department (Wall Street Journal) 165 6.13 For These 55 Marijuana Companies, Every Day is 4/20, by Alex Tribou and Adam Pearce (Bloomberg Visual Data) 166 6.14 UK Public Sector Capital Expenditure, 2014/15 167 6.15 Global Competitiveness Report 2014–2015, by Bocoup and the World Economic Forum 168 6.16 Excerpt from a Rugby Union Player Dashboard 169 6.17 Range of Temperatures (°F) Recorded in the Top 10 Most Populated Cities During 2015 170 6.18 This Chart Shows How Much More Ivy League Grads Make Than You, by Christopher Ingraham (The Washington Post) 171 6.19 Comparing Critics Scores (Rotten Tomatoes) for Major Movie Franchises 172 6.20 A Career in Numbers: Movies Starring Michael Caine 173 6.21 Comparing the Frequency of Words Used in Chapter 1 of this Book 174 6.22 Summary of Eligible Votes in the UK General Election 2015 175 6.23 The Changing Fortunes of Internet Explorer and Google Chrome 176 6.24 Literarcy Proficiency: Adult Levels by Country 177 6.25 Political Polarization in the American Public’, Pew Research Center, Washington, DC (February, 2015) (http://www.people- press.org/2014/06/12/political-polarization-in-the-american-public/) 178 6.26 Finviz (www.finviz.com) 179 6.27 This Venn Diagram Shows Where You Can Both Smoke Weed and Get a Same-Sex Marriage, by Phillip Bump (The Washington Post) 180 6.28 The 200+ Beer Brands of SAB InBev, by Maarten Lambrechts for Mediafin: www.tijd.be/sabinbev (Dutch),
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www.lecho.be/service/sabinbev (French) 181 6.29 Which Fossil Fuel Companies are Most Responsible for Climate Change? by Duncan Clark and Robin Houston (Kiln), published in the Guardian, drawing on work by Mike Bostock and Jason Davies 182 6.30 How Long Will We Live – And How Well? by Bonnie Berkowitz, Emily Chow and Todd Lindeman (The Washington Post) 183 6.31 Crime Rates by State, by Nathan Yau 184 6.32 Nutrient Contents – Parallel Coordinates, by Kai Chang (@syntagmatic) 185 6.33 How the ‘Avengers’ Line-up Has Changed Over the Years, by Jon Keegan (Wall Street Journal) 186 6.34 Interactive Fixture Molecules, by @experimental361 and @bootifulgame 187 6.35 The Rise of Partisanship and Super-cooperators in the U.S. House of Representatives. Visualisation by Mauro Martino, authored by Clio Andris, David Lee, Marcus J. Hamilton, Mauro Martino, Christian E. Gunning, and John Armistead Selde 188 6.36 The Global Flow of People, by Nikola Sander, Guy J. Abel and Ramon Bauer 189 6.37 UK Election Results by Political Party, 2010 vs 2015 190 6.38 The Fall and Rise of U.S. Inequality, in Two Graphs. Source: World Top Incomes Database; Design credit: Quoctrung Bui (NPR) 191 6.39 Census Bump: Rank of the Most Populous Cities at Each Census, 1790–1890, by Jim Vallandingham 192 6.40 Coal, Gas, Nuclear, Hydro? How Your State Generates Power. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Credit: Christopher Groskopf, Alyson Hurt and Avie Schneider (NPR) 193 6.41 Holdouts Find Cheapest Super Bowl Tickets Late in the Game, by Alex Tribou, David Ingold and Jeremy Diamond (Bloomberg Visual Data) 194 6.42 Crude Oil Prices (West Texas Intermediate), 1985–2015 195 6.43 Percentage Change in Price for Select Food Items, Since 1990, by Nathan Yau 196 6.44 The Ebb and Flow of Movies: Box Office Receipts 1986–2008, by Mathew Bloch, Lee Byron, Shan Carter and Amanda Cox (The New York Times) 197 6.45 Tracing the History of N.C.A.A. Conferences, by Mike Bostock,
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Shan Carter and Kevin Quealy (The New York Times) 198 6.46 A Presidential Gantt Chart, by Ben Jones 199 6.47 How the ‘Avengers’ Line-up Has Changed Over the Years, by Jon Keegan (Wall Street Journal) 200 6.48 Native and New Berliners – How the S-Bahn Ring Divides the City, by Julius Tröger, André Pätzold, David Wendler (Berliner Morgenpost) and Moritz Klack (webkid.io) 201 6.49 How Y’all, Youse and You Guys Talk, by Josh Katz (The New York Times) 202 6.50 Here’s Exactly Where the Candidates Cash Came From, by Zach Mider, Christopher Cannon, and Adam Pearce (Bloomberg Visual Data) 203 6.51 Trillions of Trees, by Jan Willem Tulp 204 6.52 The Racial Dot Map. Image Copyright, 2013, Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service, Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia (Dustin A. Cable, creator) 205 6.53 Arteries of the City, by Simon Scarr (South China Morning Post) 206 6.54 The Carbon Map, by Duncan Clark and Robin Houston (Kiln) 207 6.55 Election Dashboard, by Jay Boice, Aaron Bycoffe and Andrei Scheinkman (Huffington Post). Statistical model created by Simon Jackman 208 6.56 London is Rubbish at Recycling and Many Boroughs are Getting Worse, by URBS London using London Squared Map © 2015 www.aftertheflood.co 209 6.57 Automating the Design of Graphical Presentations of Relational Information. Adapted from McKinlay, J. D. (1986). ACM Transactions on Graphics, 5(2), 110–141. 213 6.58 Comparison of Judging Line Size vs Area Size 213 6.59 Comparison of Judging Related Items Using Variation in Colour (Hue) vs Variation in Shape 214 6.60 Illustrating the Correct and Incorrect Circle Size Encoding 216 6.61 Illustrating the Distortions Created by 3D Decoration 217 6.62 Example of a Bullet Chart using Banding Overlays 218 6.63 Excerpt from What’s Really Warming the World? by Eric Roston and Blacki Migliozzi (Bloomberg Visual Data) 218 6.64 Example of Using Markers Overlays 219 6.65 Why Is Her Paycheck Smaller? by Hannah Fairfield and Graham Roberts (The New York Times) 219
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6.66 Inside the Powerful Lobby Fighting for Your Right to Eat Pizza, by Andrew Martin and Bloomberg Visual Data 220 6.67 Excerpt from ‘Razor Sales Move Online, Away From Gillette’, by Graphics Department (Wall Street Journal) 220 7.1 US Gun Deaths, by Periscopic 225 7.2 Finviz (www.finviz.com) 226 7.3 The Racial Dot Map: Image Copyright, 2013, Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service, Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia (Dustin A. Cable, creator) 227 7.4 Obesity Around the World, by Jeff Clark 228 7.5 Excerpt from ‘Social Progress Index 2015’, by Social Progress Imperative, 2015 228 7.6 NFL Players: Height & Weight Over Time, by Noah Veltman (noahveltman.com) 229 7.7 Excerpt from ‘How Americans Die’, by Matthew C. Klein and Bloomberg Visual Data 230 7.8 Model Projections of Maximum Air Temperatures Near the Ocean and Land Surface on the June Solstice in 2014 and 2099: NASA Earth Observatory maps, by Joshua Stevens 231 7.9 Excerpt from ‘A Swing of Beauty’, by Sohail Al-Jamea, Wilson Andrews, Bonnie Berkowitz and Todd Lindeman (The Washington Post) 231 7.10 How Well Do You Know Your Area? by ONS Digital Content team 232 7.11 Excerpt from ‘Who Old Are You?’, by David McCandless and Tom Evans 233 7.12 512 Paths to the White House, by Mike Bostock and Shan Carter (The New York Times) 233 7.13 OECD Better Life Index, by Moritz Stefaner, Dominikus Baur, Raureif GmbH 233 7.14 Nobel Laureates, by Matthew Weber (Reuters Graphics) 234 7.15 Geography of a Recession, by Graphics Department (The New York Times) 234 7.16 How Big Will the UK Population be in 25 Years Time? by ONS Digital Content team 234 7.17 Excerpt from ‘Workers’ Compensation Reforms by State’, by Yue Qiu and Michael Grabell (ProPublica) 235 7.18 Excerpt from ‘ECB Bank Test Results’, by Monica Ulmanu, Laura Noonan and Vincent Flasseur (Reuters Graphics) 236 7.19 History Through the President’s Words, by Kennedy Elliott, Ted