Category Archives: Showing Data

The President’s SOTU Slide Presentation

Did you know that the President gave a slide presentation Tuesday night? Barack Obama did not pull an Andrew Cuomo and use actual slides behind him, but there were indeed accompanying graphics and visuals to his State of the Union address. As in years past, the White House released an “Enhanced” State of the Union video presentation available on their website.

The White House’s solution to visually communicating the President’s message is to place vertical graphics next to the video at selected points. If you haven’t seen how the visuals support and enhance the speech, definitely take a look.

This is a technique that I really loved initially, but this year the White House’s graphics department seemed asleep at the wheel. Believe me, I know how quickly these graphics were probably created, but while there were a few moments in which the visuals truly aided the message, I felt as the entire approach lacked the touch of a skilled information designer.

There was confusing use of highlights—is the focus the blue or the red figures…?

There were color combinations that would get you kicked out of a freshman year design course—red text over blue “vibrates” and is a rookie mistake…

There was lackluster imagery, cheesy text effects and overuse of all caps…

And downright confusing stats and graphics…

What was good?

Some very direct charts and good colors…

Good use of imagery and humor…

And humanity and a sense of the personal…

I personally don’t look forward to the day that projection screens are installed behind the President for the State of the Union, but it may just be inevitable.

     
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Categories: Imagery, Presenting Live, Showing Data, Visual Thinking.

FF Chartwell: A Font that Creates Charts

FF Chartwell is a new font that does something I’ve never remotely seen in a typeface. By exploiting tricks and capabilities contained within OpenType, FF Chartwell allows you to type in and color a string of numbers, and with a couple of clicks, convert the text to a series of charts or data vizualizations. 

The numbers stay live, and can be edited, updating the chart.

One colleague has already started using FF Chartwell as a big timesaver when creating infographics, instead of going back and forth with Excel. But FF Chartwell also offers a few types of charts that Excel does not.

I’ve only just started playing with it, but it’s very, very, very cool.

Buy it here. 

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Categories: Information Design, Showing Data.

Edward Tufte upcoming Seminars

That lovable curmudgeon of data is on tour again. Check out his upcoming seminars in Denver, Seattle, Portland, Chicago, New York, Minneapolis, Arlington, San Francisco and San Jose

And start thinking of a question to stump him with in the Q&A. Last time I went, I didn’t anticipate the following would leave him speechless, but it did: “Other than you, who do you consider to be a good speaker?” 

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Categories: Information Design, Showing Data.

My First Presentation

So my Mom sent me a bunch of old photos of me, and the above was mixed in. The best part was the note she had written on the back of it years ago:

I was probably in 2nd grade, and I only have a vague recollection of this, but I have to imagine this was for some sort of science fair. I wish the resolution was better so I could make out my hypothesis and conclusion, but I’m guessing I came to the very scientific verdict that processed snack cakes are bad for your health.

But look at my design chops! I chunked my content, I had good contrast, a simple and direct header, lots of negative space. And take a gander at those bar charts. Okay, too many colors, but there doesn’t seem to be all that much chart junk in them.

Go 2nd grade me!

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Categories: Information Design, Showing Data, Simplicity.

Blender Chartjunk – There’s Always a way to simplify further

So we were just given as a gift the most amazing blender I’ve ever seen. It’s called a Blendtec, and these guys are serious not just about blending, but industrial and product design. Seriously, take a look at the product video on their home page.

One of the things that sets this blender apart from others is that there are pre-programmed functions that combine different speeds with different times. In other words, the Blendtec people have decided that the best way to crush ice is to do it at a certain speed for 15 seconds, then a higher speed for 10 seconds, then back to the original speed for another 10 seconds. And this is what the pre-programmed “Crush Ice” setting does. Cool! But how do you describe this exactly to the consumer?

THE PRODUCT MANUAL

Another company would have explained the process in a table of numbers, no doubt. But Blendtec wisely explained it graphically:

 SIMPLIFY…

I loved it, but…it still took me a few seconds to figure out exactly what was being communicated. What threw me were the heavy boxes. They were chartjunk. There was so much ink on the page, it was distracting, and since the boxes were different shades, I assumed that the shading carried some meaning. But the shading really doesn’t impart any information. It’s a red herring. I thought it deserved further simplification, and that I could do better. First I tried this…

It was better, I thought. The shadings were gone, and the story was actually a little clearer. But were any shadings necessary? Could more screen ink be removed…?

This was what I settled on…

 

Is this better? And by that, I mean clearer? Thoughts?

Okay, now it’s time for margharitas!

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Categories: Design, Information Design, Showing Data, Simplicity, Visual Thinking.

Data-Ink and The Dangers of Chart Junk in Information Design

I wrote the following for an internal Edelman blog and thought I’d post it here as well…

“Data-Ink Ratio” is a principle originated and championed by Edward Tufte, the godfather of modern information design. Tufte has been both lauded and vilified for his insistence on minimalism, a philosophy that is at the heart of Data-Ink Ratio.

In short, Data-Ink is the amount of ink (or pixels) devoted to actually communicating information. Any graphics, decorations or text that don’t explicitly communicate one’s story are considered extraneous and unhelpful. So, expressed as a ratio of Data-Ink to total ink, one would want a number as close to “1” as possible. A low Data-Ink ratio of .1 would mean that for every one pixel that communicates your message, nine pixels are wasting space and your audience’s attention.
 
Here’s a simple visual explanation of all that previous ink I just used:
 
The one on the right communicates the same information and does it with less distraction once the gridlines, background and redundant labeling are removed. Here is the leftover “fat,” also termed “Chart Junk” by Tufte, that has been trimmed away:

The Dangers of Decoration

Here are two infographics that I feel are simply overdesigned and filled with chart junk. Yes, they’re clever, but does the design aid or hinder a quick reading of the information?
 
 
 
(Credit: Mint.com)
 
Here’s another infographic that has a very simple message, but one that takes longer to process because of the added graphic design. What’s the Data-Ink ratio here? 
 
(Credit: Mashable.com)
 
Finally, I saw this very basic infographic the other day. While I take exception with how some of this data is being manipulated and framed, graphically I think it works quite well. Certainly, I was able to understand the message in mere seconds. High Data-Ink ratio saves the day here!
 (Credit: ThinkProgress.org) 
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Categories: Design, Information Design, Showing Data, Simplicity, Visual Thinking.
visual training presentation