iLoveCharts

iLoveCharts

by Lainie Turner  |  May 18th, 2010
Design, Everything Else, Just For Fun


 

 
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I do, I love charts. But only charts that look clean and communicate something effectively. Here’s an icon development process flow chart, which I ran across today on Wikipedia. It may not reflect a perfect model for designing icons, but I like the way it communicates. It seems to be at the right level of detail for me: I want to know a bit about the process, but I’m not a professional Graphic Designer. See what you think. After the jump you can click the graphic to see the chart at full size.


Back in the late 1990s I attended a class with information designer Edward Tufte, who literally wrote the book on “The Visual Display of Quantitative Information.” Tufte is considered by many to be the leading authority on clearly and effectively depicting data in graphic form, and has for decades been helping designers avoid the pitfalls of depicting data sloppily in diagrams, charts, tables and reports. It was an eye-opener to spend 5 or 6 hours in Tufte’s company, examining in detail examples of graphic information that work beautifully and others that failed catastrophically. But I think I loved charts even before that class.


If you love charts, you should really know about the site “ChartPorn: data visualizations you just gotta love.” ChartPorn is basically a visual blog chock full of “charts, tables, maps, and interactive data toys, with a focus on economics and graphic design.” The images come from all across the web, and range from humorous to deadly serious. Here, you can learn through diagrams all about  the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill,  examine a flow chart that pokes fun at how designers select typefaces, learn how to cook, or play with a picture-based, interactive “History of the World Through Objects” from the BBC, featuring objects from The British Museum, complete with zoom and descriptions. Surf the ChartPorn site at your own risk: I’ve been known to lose entire afternoons over there. I’d say that makes me an official Chart Geek, but I’m not ready to join the union.

Lainie Turner

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Reader comments (6)

 

Funny thing, I got an invite just last week from Tufte to attend one of his upcoming seminars. A group of us from Edge went prolly 7 or 8 years ago. Still have his books! Good stuff.


Jeff Jimerson | May 18, 2010

Not a designer myself either, but I appreciate an idea visually well communicated. The downside is, I think people tend to be less skeptical of data presented visually, so it leaves it more open to being skewed.


Matt Riopelle | May 19, 2010

Yeah, my favorite examples of “charts that lie” are line or bar charts that don’t start with zero on the x-axis. I’m sure some people do it innocently, but when the lines in a graph appear steeper or more dramatic than the growth/decline actually is, well, that’s just not being honest!


Jeff Jimerson | May 19, 2010

Very cool Lainie. I never knew you were a fellow Chart Geek. Your afternoons might wish I was still unaware… http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/ and http://flowingdata.com/


Andrew Von Dollen | May 20, 2010

Lainie I had no idea. Have you ever seen http://graphjam.com? Who says data visualization is boring? One of these days I’m hoping they will accept one of my submissions!


Loyan | May 20, 2010

@Matt: Precisely. This is exactly the mission of Edward Tufte: make sure if you are using charts (or any other type of illustration to convey info) it tells the truth in a way that is clear and exact.

@Andrew: Thanks … a LOT. Now my weekend is trashed. :)

@Loyan: Graphjam is great for giggles. So many creative people. I couldn’t help but run across it, being a fan of the cheezburger kittehs!


Lainie Turner | May 23, 2010
 


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