November 17, 2006
Information Design Watch
From Dynamic Diagrams
Design for Understanding
In This Issue:
VISUAL EXPLANATION
- A Pair of U.S. Mid-Term Election Maps
- The One Page Powerpoint of Iraq
- The Informational Power of Scale Models
- Science and NSF Announce 2006 Visualization Challenge Winners
DYNAMIC DIAGRAMS NEWS
- Dynamic Diagrams Project Wins eHealthcare Leadership Awards
- Dennis Dimos and Allie Crowder-Schaefer Join Dynamic Diagrams
- Information Design Consultant Needed
VISUAL EXPLANATION
A Pair of U.S. Mid-Term Election Maps
Posted by Henry Woodbury
Here's CNN's take on the Virginia Senate Race:
What's interesting: Color gradation makes it easy to see each candidate's regional strengths. In effect, since "Other" did not make a showing, the full gradation is from saturated blue (DEM) through white (tie) to saturated red (GOP). The key could be redesigned to demonstrate this.
What's missing: Names of cities. Ability to compare the separate "Webb Strength" and "Allen Strength" maps in tandem.
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2006/pages/results/states/VA/S/01/index.html
Here's the New York Times' take on the House of Representative races, nation-wide:
What's interesting: The geographical map first displayed morphs to present each congressional district as an equal unit. Click on any state to see the district numbers.
What's missing: Ability to toggle back to a geographical view.
http://www.nytimes.com/ref/elections/2006/House.html
The One Page Powerpoint of Iraq
Posted by Henry Woodbury
To track the situtation in Iraq, the United States Central Command turns to visual explanation. A slide shown in a recent classified briefing includes a one-dimensional heat map -- what the New York Times calls a "color-coded bar chart" -- to present an "Index of Civil Conflict":
Befitting the news angle, reporter Michael R. Gordon focuses on the indicators that inform the index. From an information design angle, the most interesting part of the graphic is the gray arrow labeled "Last Week." All it would take to turn the chart into a two-dimensional line chart is a time axis and historical data. To create a truly multivariate information graphic, the indicators could be indexed to the map, assuming a coherent algorithm for doing so exists. Of course all that information is classified.
Another obvious variable that could be integrated into the index is geography. While a time series would illuminate trends, a heat chart overlaid on the map of the country would identify trouble spots. Add in the geographic location of the indicators and you could start seeing holes in the data.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/01/world/middleeast/01military.html (restricted)
The Informational Power of Scale Models
Posted by Henry Woodbury
Jeff Russell's Starship Dimensions web site presents visual information of a single type, the scale model. The power of this approach is its universal applicability. Note Russell's disclaimer:
This site is only intended to compare the actual physical dimensions of the starships herein, and makes no claims as to any other aspect of these ships (firepower, speed, etc.).
In displaying the models, Russell makes some elegant design decisions. The starships (and other objects) are grouped by size, on background-gridded pages scaled from 1m/10px, to the truly enormous 500,000km/pixel. The largest models on each page reoccur on the next, helping define a visual continuum. The site also allows you to drag and drop images on each page (Internet Explorer only), making direct comparisons that much easier.
Maybe I'm old school, but the most entertaining comparison for me was this one:
http://www.merzo.net/index.html
Science and NSF Announce 2006 Visualization Challenge Winners
Posted by Lisa Agustin
The results are in: Science magazine and the National Science Foundation recently announced the winners of this year's Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge. Categories for competition include photography, illustration, infographics, and multimedia (interactive and non-interactive). The winning visualizations offer new perspectives on a variety of subjects: mathematical surfaces rendered as glass objects, how air traffic looks at night, cellular dynamics, the vasculature of conjoined twins, and the science behind daVinci's work.
According to Felice Frankel, a senior research fellow at Harvard University and one of this year's judges, good visualization plays a key role in advancing scientific thought:
The science community needs to discuss the enormous contribution good visual translations can bring to both communication and advancing the thinking behind the science. Critically thinking about what makes an honest and successful representation and raising our standards can only be beneficial for the science community as a whole.
The site includes a slide show of this year's winners as well as links to results from previous years.
http://www.sciencemag.org/sciext/vis2006/
DYNAMIC DIAGRAMS NEWS
Dynamic Diagrams Project Wins eHealthcare Leadership Awards
Posted by Lisa Agustin
Sentara Healthcare, a healthcare organization based in southeastern Virginia, recently received two eHealthcare Leadership Awards for its public-facing web site, Sentara.com. The site received the awards from eHealthcare Strategy & Trends magazine in the categories of "Best Quality Communication" and "Best Overall Internet Site" for a healthcare system. Dynamic Diagrams partnered with Sentara to create a new information architecture and supporting visual design, with the goal of enabling deeper online interaction between patients and the Sentara organization. The redesign was also an early step in the organization's plan for a role-based enterprise portal, which will eventually merge Sentara.com with the organization's employee and provider intranet sites, and the public site for its health insurance plan, Optima Health.
http://www.strategichealthcare.com/awards/index.php
Dennis Dimos and Allie Crowder-Schaefer Join Dynamic Diagrams
Dynamic Diagrams added two new staff members this month: Dennis Dimos, Senior Visual Designer, and Allie Crowder-Schaefer, Office Manager. With design-leadership roles at Wired, Red Hat, and most recently at Parametric Technology Corporation, Dennis couples extensive new media experience with tremendous analytical and creative skills. Allie comes to us with over seven years administrative experience including project management and event planning. We're pleased to have them on board!
Information Design Consultant Needed
Join the Dynamic Diagrams team and help create new ways to visualize complex information! We have a full-time, permanent position open for an information design professional with proven experience in information design, marketing strategy, and communications. For details, see our Careers page:
http://www.dynamicdiagrams.com/about/careers.html
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