Top 5 of our Favourite Things: Data Visualizations
If the words “data” and “visualization” make you wish the left side of your brain was a tad sharper, read on! Nobody – least of all the creative (at best) right-brainers among us – enjoys looking at graphs or statistics. Yawn! Lucky for us then, that boring charts etcetera are fast becoming a relic of the past. Nowadays, the global graphic design army (how many do YOU know?) do the boring bit for us, and produce beautiful works of art which communicate an abundance of information while entertaining us – and pleasing our peepers - all at once. We rather liked these five.
1. Aaron Koblin’s Flight Patterns
Is it art? Is it science? No, it’s an animated visual tracing the traffic patterns and density of 24 hours worth of airplanes over the US, collected and issued by the Federal Flight Aviation Administration. It was created by artist and all-round megabot Aaron Koblin, who you might know from his delicious Radiohead clip for House of Cards.
2. Newsmap
This really is rather handy! An online application which displays the gargantuan amounts of information processed by the Google News aggregator in a digestible Treemap format which is even kinda pretty to look at. The size of each cell demonstrates the importance of news stories, giving greater weight to those which get the most coverage and organizing them by region, topic and time.
3. The Cost of War
An audio timeline of sorts provides the basis for this frankly horrible collection of statistics about how much America spends on the Iraq war. Although a little outdated (a sad relic from the Bush era), it’s a great example of super-speedy information communication, which will shock and overwhelm – but that’s the point.
4. Internet Censorship
This controversial animation introduces us to some of the most glaring issues around internet censorship in places like Myanmar and China, where information is monitored and restricted, and where bloggers suffer torturous consequences if they so much as hint at critiquing their governments. You might have to watch it twice as the barrage of information is quite barrage-like – but it should sink in after round two.
5. Little Red Riding Hood
Created by mere student Tomas Nilsson, this little gem takes us through the ubiquitous tale of the unfortunate Ms Riding Hood, in a way you’ve never seen before. Ever wondered what the nutritional value of Grandma is? Or what the eco-system of the Hundred-Acre Wood looks like? All your questions answered here in a visually delightful snippet of animated glory.
