Graphics 2 information graphics 2

1. Graphics 2information graphics 2

2. introduction • earliest information graphics • first attempts to systemise the presentation of information using graphics; Playfair, Minard • presenting quantitive information with graphic displays; Tufte • complex communication; pictograms in medicine • conclusion; influence on graphic design • examples of contemporary information graphics

3. Lascaux caves; earliest maps found show the night sky 16,000 BC Çatalhöyük drawing may be a plan of the village 7,000 BC Hecataeus of Miletus earliest surviving ‘map of the world’ 450 BC Claudius Ptolemy represented spherical shape of the earth with perspective map in his Geographia 100 AD earliest information graphics - maps

4. Scottish engineer and economist; regarded as the founder of graphical statistics credited with inventing the line graph and bar chart in his ‘Commercial and Political Atlas’ published 1786 also credited with the pie chart, appearing in his work ‘Statistical Breviary’ published 1881 William Playfair

5. French civil engineer, pioneered the use of graphs; represented statistical information using diagrams used graphical techniques to explain engineering principles 1869 published statistical representation of Napolean’s Russian Campaign 1812 shows the position and direction of forces shows where forces split and where they joined shows declining numbers and where major losses occurred shows the temperatures at key points developed what has come to be known as a ‘flow map’ described by Edward Tufte as ‘the best statistical graphic ever drawn’ (Tufte, 1983) Charles Joseph Minard

6. Minard’s diagram of Napolean’s Russian Campaign, published 1869

7. US statistician, Emeritus Professor at Yale taught political economy and data analysis at Princeton, 1968 developed a course on statistics and prepared seminars on statistical graphics, working with John Tukey (pioneer in information graphics) 1982 mortgaged his home and financed his book ‘The Visual Display of Quantitative Information’ Edward Tufte

8. coined the term ‘chartjunk’ for information graphics; any part of the graphic that does not provide useful information anything that distracts the viewer from the information that is important chartjunk undermines the purpose of the display the display should be used to provide information elements in the display that do not provide information compete for the viewers attention with elements that do the appearance of the display should never take precedence over its function gradient shading, heavy lines, colours, elaborate text, backgrounds, etc a good graphic is one that minimises ‘non-data-ink or redundant data-ink’ (Tufte, 1983) Edward Tufte - ‘chartjunk’

9. Tufte advocates data rich displays that contain as much information as possible (eg Minard’s Russian Campaign chart); provide a single source for a variety of related information offer the user the opportunity to spot correlations and trends that might not otherwise be apparent the ‘sparkline’ was proposed by Tufte as an alternative to a full graphic representation set aside from the main text "data-intense, design-simple, word-sized graphics“ (Tufte, 2006) designed to be memorable and nearly as easily understood as the words in the sentence below is an extract from wikipedia illustrating the use of a sparkline; Edward Tufte - ‘Sparkline’

10. highly critical of Powerpoint and its successors; ‘The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint’ – the affect of using Powepoint’s built in styles, templates and wizards ‘PowerPoint Does Rocket Science’ – analysis of the slides used by Boeing to explain to NASA management the risk to Columbia main criticisms relate to the way Powerpoint discourages effective presentations; too many levels, eg each of the NASA slides contained four to six levels of hierarchy! default layouts lead presenters to work around images, rather than place them where they are needed charts and graphs are simplistic and lack resolution – misleading aimed at the presenter rather than the audience – 35mm and overhead projectors provided information, not autocue Edward Tufte - presentations

11. road signs Italian Touring Club 1895 International Road Congress, Rome 1908 UK Road Traffic Act 1930 Anderson Committee 1957 Neurath and Isotype airport signs Association of German Airports 1968, Kapitzki industry Esso 1975, Institute for Environmental Design; Speikerman space! the Pioneer plaque is designed to communicate without language to extraterrestrial life… a few other important developments

13. top left provides a representation of hydrogen atoms most abundant element in the universe used to derive a measurement of length (21cm) and time highly iconic representation of human male and female binary equivalent of decimal 8 (1000) provides height of figure (8 x 21 = 168cm) the relative position to the sun of 14 pulsars is shown dotted lines provide pulse frequencies in units derived from hydrogen atom behaviour a map of the solar system is included, and shows the trajectory of the probe an outline of the probe is shown to scale behind the figures Pioneer 10 and 11 plaques

14. the work of Kapitzki, Neurath, Tufte and others suggest principles that might guide pictogram design; don’t add more to the display than is necessary for meaning meaning comes from differences – don’t add differences unless you want to add meaning hierarchies are easily perceived information that is low in the hierarchy is prescribed less importance how have these principles been applied? pictograms for complex instructions – medicine going to extremes – pictograms that are language information graphics and pictograms

15. pictograms for complex instructions - medicines US Pharmacopeia - USP

16. pictograms for complex instructions - medicines

17. i pictograms for complex instructions - medicines

18. physical or pathological states are represented; colour indicates moment the state occurs shape indicates physical (circle) or pathological (square) pictogram represents area of enquiry combination of primitive graphic elements conveys concepts and procedures pictograms for complex instructions - medicines

19. an attempt to construct a written language with pictograms http://www.icon-language.com available as ‘opentype’ fonts to download ‘everything possible with alphabetic characters is possible also with these icon-fonts’ pictorial language – Jochen Gros

20. information graphics was pioneered in areas where quantifying and visualising information were important, eg Tufte graphic designers have drawn on the principles used in diagrams, cartograms and iconograms conveying ‘everyday information’ graphically using semiotic principles to optimise design (something that’s different and can be substituted, something that’s the same and can be compared) The most successful information graphics designers have changed the way we provide information; Herbert Kapitzki, Otl Aicher, Eric Speikermann In doing so they have had a tremendous influence on all areas of graphic design; the move away from art and towards uniformity pursuing excellence in simplicity, allowing minimal representations to convey maximum information conclusion

21. Innovative interactive information graphic on movie box office revenue, NYT; http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/02/23/movies/20080223_REVENUE_GRAPHIC.html A list of clever information graphics to browse through http://blogof.francescomugnai.com/2009/04/50-great-examples-of-infographics/ examples

22. sources • Tufte, Edward R (1983) The visual display of quantitative information, Graphics Press. • ‘The Work of Edward Tufte and Graphics Press’, [online] Available from: http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/ (Accessed 10 March 2009). • Baldwin, Jonathan and Roberts, Lucienne (2006) Visual Communication: From Theory to Practice, AVA Publishing.   • Lamy, Jean-Baptiste, Duclos, Catherine, Bar-Hen, Avner, Ouvrard, Patrick and Venot, Alain:An iconic language for the graphical representation of medical concepts, [online] Available from: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6947/8/16 (Accessed 17 March 2009). • http://www.usp.org/audiences/consumers/pictograms • Tufte, Edward R. (1990) Envisioning Information, Graphics Press USA.  519.530222 TUF/X • Abdullah, Rayan and Habner, Roger (2006) Pictograms, Icons & Signs: A Guide to Information Graphics, illustrated edition. Thames & Hudson.   • http://www.icon-language.net/english/project.html