Visual confections are more than mere presentation

Posted by on Feb 15, 2010 in Blog, class, data visualizations, theory, tufte | One Comment

Data visualization.  It’s one of those terms that can mean so many things.  I say I’m doing an independent study on data visualization this quarter.  That’s true.  But a better description would be “data visualizations for journalism.”  I’ve talked about this with people before, a lot of pieces are gorgeous, and they do convey information, ...

Read More

Repetition, repetition: The power of multiples

Posted by on Feb 9, 2010 in Blog, class, tufte | No Comments

Teachers are true heroes in today’s society, I owe so much to almost every one that I’ve ever had the privilege of working with. As the daughter of an elementary school teacher, and from teaching some classes on my own, I know that repetition is a key part of passing knowledge from your brain to ...

Read More

Personal reflection: Tufte’s messing with my head

Posted by on Jan 25, 2010 in Blog, theory, tufte | No Comments

My eyes have been opened by the readings I’ve been doing from Tufte. While I only assigned myself “Visual Explanations,” I’m beginning to feel as if I want to soak up as much of his work as possible. So, I went to my advisor’s office (Rich Gordon), where the walls are lined with what feels ...

Read More

Keep it subtle, stupid: Differentiating data values in visualizations

Posted by on Jan 25, 2010 in Blog, class, tufte | No Comments

I’m not anything resembling a visual genius, but I like to believe I have enough of an eye that I can tell what works and what doesn’t.  The reason Tufte’s books are so helpful is that they tell me why something works, and give me rules so I know what I can and can’t do.  ...

Read More