Book Image

Visualize This

By : Nathan Yau‚ÄØ
Book Image

Visualize This

By: Nathan Yau‚ÄØ

Overview of this book

Visualize This is a guide on how to visualize and tell stories with data, providing practical design tips complemented with step-by-step tutorials. It begins with a description of the huge growth of data and visualization in industry, news, and gov't and opportunities for those who tell stories with data. Logically it moves on to actual stories in data-statistical ones with trends and human stories. the technical part comes up quickly with how to gather, parse and format data with Python, R, Excel, Google docs, and so on, and details tools to visualize data-native graphics for the Web like ActionScript, Flash libraries, PHP, JavaScript, CSS, HTML. Every chapter provides an example as well. Patterns over time and kinds of data charts are followed by proportions, chart types and examples. Next, examples and descriptions of outliers and how to show them, different kinds of maps, how to guide your readers and explain the data "in the visualization". The book ends with a value-add appendix on graphical perception.

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Visualize This
Nathan Yau‚ÄØ
Jul, 2011 | 384 pages
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Table of Contents (12 chapters)
Free Chapter
1
Cover
Cover
2
Contents
Contents
3
Chapter 1: Telling Stories with Data
Chapter 1: Telling Stories with Data
More Than Numbers
What to Look For
Design
Wrapping Up
4
Chapter 2: Handling Data
Chapter 2: Handling Data
Gather Data
Formatting Data
Wrapping Up
5
Chapter 3: Choosing Tools to Visualize Data
Chapter 3: Choosing Tools to Visualize Data
Out-of-the-Box Visualization
Programming
Illustration
Mapping
Survey Your Options
Wrapping Up
6
Chapter 4: Visualizing Patterns over Time
Chapter 4: Visualizing Patterns over Time
What to Look for over Time
Discrete Points in Time
Continuous Data
Wrapping Up
7
Chapter 5: Visualizing Proportions
Chapter 5: Visualizing Proportions
What to Look for in Proportions
Parts of a Whole
Proportions over Time
Wrapping Up
8
Chapter 6: Visualizing Relationships
Chapter 6: Visualizing Relationships
What Relationships to Look For
Correlation
Distribution
Comparison
Wrapping Up
9
Chapter 7: Spotting Differences
Chapter 7: Spotting Differences
What to Look For
Comparing across Multiple Variables
Reducing Dimensions
Searching for Outliers
Wrapping Up
10
Chapter 8: Visualizing Spatial Relationships
Chapter 8: Visualizing Spatial Relationships
What to Look For
Specific Locations
Regions
Over Space and Time
Wrapping Up
11
Chapter 9: Designing with a Purpose
Chapter 9: Designing with a Purpose
Prepare Yourself
Prepare Your Readers
Visual Cues
Good Visualization
Wrapping Up
12
Introduction
Introduction
Learning Data

Chapter 8

Visualizing Spatial Relationships

Maps are a subcategory of visualization that have the added benefit of being incredibly intuitive. Even as a kid, I could read them. I remember sitting in the passenger seat of my dad’s car and sounding off directions as I read the fantastically big unfolded map laid out in front of me. An Australian lady with a robotic yet calming voice spits out directions from a small box on the dash nowadays.

In any case, maps are a great way to understand your data. They are scaled down versions of the physical world, and they’re everywhere. In this chapter you dive into several spatial datasets, looking for patterns over space and time. You create some basic maps in R and then jump to more advanced mapping with Python and SVG. Finally, you round it up with interactive and animated maps in ActionScript and Flash.

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