Eric Doversberger - Visualization

Visualization

Top Online Interactive Data Visualizations

Name Voyager

A textbook example of the power of visualization to discover trends in otherwise incomprehensible amounts of data.

This visualization draws the user into exploring the popularity of first names (and their stems) throughout the last 100+ years of US Census data.

The display uniquely and beautifully articulates its source data and, coupled with its addictive interactivity, entices the user into querying the names of everyone they know while uncovering new and interesting patterns.

Martin Wattenberg, IBM Research

[link]

Related: sense.us, history flow

Google Maps

Google Maps brought cartography to the masses.

Showcasing the power of AJAX, the visualization epitomizes geospatial drill-down and interactivity. Best yet, its easy and extensible API continues to result in an incredibly diverse array of mash-ups and annotations from plotting real estate data to helping families and relief groups self-organize in the wake of the Katrina Hurricane.

Google

[link]

Related: Google Earth

Map of the Market

The market performance of hundreds of stocks - complete with industry and value context - communicated to the user in an instant.

A succinct and elegant example of how even volumous and multivariate hierarchical data can be effectively visualized.

Martin Wattenberg, IBM Research

[link]

Related: newsmap

Prefuse/Flare

BSD-licensed libraries (in Java and ActionScript) for building out a magnitude of rich data visualizations.

This featured Treeview work showcases the powerful modularity built into Prefuse enabling the quick addition of parsing, animation, and interaction into personal projects.

Jeffrey Heer, Berkeley

[link] [movie]

Related: Processing

Many Eyes

A pioneering effort to scale and democratize data visualization. A website where anyone can upload data and then apply numerous visualization techniques and customizations.

This is a forerunner in the evolution of the field.

Visual Communication Lab - IBM Research

[link] [movie]

Related: Swivel

Symbolic Regression

Like Name Wizard, this is a pitch-perfect visualization of its source. However, unlike the previous work, here we uniquely visualize a distinctly dynamic process whereby randomization is utilized to incrementally solve problems.

John Koza, Stanford

[link]

Related: BigSpy

Visual Thesaurus

A commercial and pop-sensible interactive graph of word synonyms and the recursive plurality of their meaning.

This is a great entry visualization for introducing anyone to how visualization can be used to accentuate and extend content.

ThinkMap

[link]

Related: Vizster, WordCount

QuerySketch

Instead of using visualization to simply show data, this work goes a step further to use interactive sketching to retrieve best-fit data.

Martin Wattenberg, IBM Research

[link]

Related: retrievr

ZipDecode

A straightforward yet gorgeous representation of how US zipcodes are mapped where every zipcode is represented by one dot. Subtle interaction allows the user to isolate and zoom in on particular regions.

The work highlights how visualization can reveal the subtle everyday patterns we might otherwise not stop to contemplate.

Ben Fry, MIT

[link] [movie]

Related: Flight Patterns

Photosynth

An immersive visualization that builds 3-D models by extracting features from digital photographs.

Straight up sci-fi.

Microsoft Live Labs

[link] [movie]

Gapminder

A call-to-arms visualization for transparency and action in public policy.

The visualization is a moving scatterplot (and more) illustrating the evolving economic and public health realities of the world.

Hans Rosling, Gapminder.org

[link] [movie]

Related: Global Rich List

We Feel Fine

This work gleans data from blogs to provide a kinetic snapshot of emotion.

This is one example where the intersection of visualization and art is made explicit. This is a particularly transient example as computer rendering is uncharacteristically set to the task of communicating the diverse range of human feelings.

Jonathan Harris and Sep Kamvar

[link] [movie]

Related: Dumpster, Sheep Market

Best Visualization Toolkits, APIs, and Libraries

Prefuse/Flare Toolkit (Java/Flex)

Processing (Java)

Google Charts API (HTML)

Google Visualization API (JavaScript)

JIT Toolkit (JavaScript)

Best Visualization Reading and Resources

Information Aesthetics

The Visual Display of Quantitative Information

Atlas of Cyberspace

TED Videos

InfoVis Wiki

The New York Times - Visualization Lab

	Name Voyager A textbook example of the power of visualization to discover trends in otherwise incomprehensible amounts of data. This visualization draws the user into exploring the popularity of first names (and their stems) throughout the last 100+ years of US Census data. The display uniquely and beautifully articulates its source data and, coupled with its addictive interactivity, entices the user into querying the names of everyone they know while uncovering new and interesting patterns. Martin Wattenberg, IBM Research [link] Related: sense.us, history flow
	Google Maps Google Maps brought cartography to the masses. Showcasing the power of AJAX, the visualization epitomizes geospatial drill-down and interactivity. Best yet, its easy and extensible API continues to result in an incredibly diverse array of mash-ups and annotations from plotting real estate data to helping families and relief groups self-organize in the wake of the Katrina Hurricane. Google [link] Related: Google Earth
	Map of the Market The market performance of hundreds of stocks - complete with industry and value context - communicated to the user in an instant. A succinct and elegant example of how even volumous and multivariate hierarchical data can be effectively visualized. Martin Wattenberg, IBM Research [link] Related: newsmap
	Prefuse/Flare BSD-licensed libraries (in Java and ActionScript) for building out a magnitude of rich data visualizations. This featured Treeview work showcases the powerful modularity built into Prefuse enabling the quick addition of parsing, animation, and interaction into personal projects. Jeffrey Heer, Berkeley [link] [movie] Related: Processing
	Many Eyes A pioneering effort to scale and democratize data visualization. A website where anyone can upload data and then apply numerous visualization techniques and customizations. This is a forerunner in the evolution of the field. Visual Communication Lab - IBM Research [link] [movie] Related: Swivel
	Symbolic Regression Like Name Wizard, this is a pitch-perfect visualization of its source. However, unlike the previous work, here we uniquely visualize a distinctly dynamic process whereby randomization is utilized to incrementally solve problems. John Koza, Stanford [link] Related: BigSpy
	Visual Thesaurus A commercial and pop-sensible interactive graph of word synonyms and the recursive plurality of their meaning. This is a great entry visualization for introducing anyone to how visualization can be used to accentuate and extend content. ThinkMap [link] Related: Vizster, WordCount
	QuerySketch Instead of using visualization to simply show data, this work goes a step further to use interactive sketching to retrieve best-fit data. Martin Wattenberg, IBM Research [link] Related: retrievr
	ZipDecode A straightforward yet gorgeous representation of how US zipcodes are mapped where every zipcode is represented by one dot. Subtle interaction allows the user to isolate and zoom in on particular regions. The work highlights how visualization can reveal the subtle everyday patterns we might otherwise not stop to contemplate. Ben Fry, MIT [link] [movie] Related: Flight Patterns
	Photosynth An immersive visualization that builds 3-D models by extracting features from digital photographs. Straight up sci-fi. Microsoft Live Labs [link] [movie]
	Gapminder A call-to-arms visualization for transparency and action in public policy. The visualization is a moving scatterplot (and more) illustrating the evolving economic and public health realities of the world. Hans Rosling, Gapminder.org [link] [movie] Related: Global Rich List
	We Feel Fine This work gleans data from blogs to provide a kinetic snapshot of emotion. This is one example where the intersection of visualization and art is made explicit. This is a particularly transient example as computer rendering is uncharacteristically set to the task of communicating the diverse range of human feelings. Jonathan Harris and Sep Kamvar [link] [movie] Related: Dumpster, Sheep Market