Visualization as Design
A look at some historic figures in data visualization along with a discussion of Tufte. Also, a look at some demonstrative examples to refine our language for discussing information design. All of this sets the stage for glyphs and our transition into cognitive and perception science.
Lesson Table of Contents
Video
Resources mentioned in the video can be found in links. Videos are hosted by Vimeo. You can load the video as an embed within this page or may view the video on Vimeo in a separate window / tab. If you enable on-site video, your preference will be remembered using a cookie.
Resources mentioned in the video can be found in links. Videos are hosted by Vimeo. You may disable Video Embeds or view the video on Vimeo.
Links
Written materials
Exercise
- Which encoding devices are used within this piece?
- What would Tufte say about the lie-factor, data-ink ratio, and data density?
Note that the Zulip community is not available to this MOOC. Please consider sharing your exercise via social media such as Bluesky with the tag #OpenDataVizSciCourse.
Reading
Next lecture
Works cited
This is the works cited from the lecture. Note that additional sources may be used in exercises and other supporting documentation.
- B. Adhikari, "Marey's train schedule," University of Missouri Saint Louis, 2021. Available: https://badriadhikari.github.io/data-viz-workshop-2021/minards/
- M. van Langren, "Grados de la Longitud," 1644. Available: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Grados_de_la_Longitud.jpg
- J. Norman, "Michael Florent van Langren issues the Earliest Known Graph of Statistical Data," History of Information, 2013. Available: https://www.historyofinformation.com/detail.php?id=3415
- W. Playfair, "Time Series of Exports and Imports of Denmark and Norway," Commercial and Political Atlas, 2011. Available: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Playfair#/media/File:Playfair_TimeSeries-2.png
- D. Bellhouse, "The Flawed Genius of William Playfair: The Story of the Father of Statistical Graphics," University of Toronto Press, 2023. Available: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3138/jj.6167271
- M. Callejon, "Masters series: William Playfair, the father of statistical graphics," Flourish, 2023. Available: https://flourish.studio/blog/masters-william-playfair-father-of-statistical-graphics/
- H. Hering, "Florence Nightingale Portrait," 1860. Available: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florence_Nightingale#/media/File:Florence_Nightingale_(H_Hering_NPG_x82368).jpg
- J. Mansky, "W.E.B. Du Bois’ Visionary Infographics Come Together for the First Time in Full Color," Smithsonian Magazine, 2018. Available: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/first-time-together-and-color-book-displays-web-du-bois-visionary-infographics-180970826/
- University of Illinois, "Faculty portrait photograph of Professor of Electrical Engineering Donald Bitzer," University of Illinois, 1971. Available: https://archon.library.illinois.edu/archives/index.php?p=digitallibrary%2Fdigitalcontent&id=7887
- J. Scott, "5.08 of BBS: The Documentary," Textfiles, 2005. Available: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PLATO_%28computer_system%29#/media/File:PLATO_chem_exp.jpg
- B. Leroy, "Review of Tufte’s The Visual Display of Quantitative Information," Carnegie Mellon University, 2018. Available: https://benjaminleroy.github.io/pages/blog/public/post/2018/05/16/review-of-tufte-s-the-visual-display-of-quantitative-information/
- M. Friendly, "Darts," York University, 2025. Available: https://www.datavis.ca/gallery/lie-factor.php.
- Princeton University, "Public Lectures: Edward Tufte (Photo)," Princeton University. Available: https://lectures.princeton.edu/lectures/2013/edward-tufte
- Union of Concerned Scientists, "Brief History of US Fuel Efficiency Standards," Union of Concerned Scientists, 2017. Available: https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/brief-history-us-fuel-efficiency
- N. Vega, "A gallon of gas was 65 cents in 1978—here’s how much it cost every year since," CNBC, 2022. Available: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/13/how-much-gas-cost-every-year-since-1978.html
- M. Dunnigan, "Why Tufte is Wrong," Medium, 2014. Available: https://medium.com/@MattDuignan/why-tuftes-wrong-a9bd6a14ff8e
- B. Adhikari, "Data Density," University of Missouri Saint Louis, 2021. Available: https://badriadhikari.github.io/data-viz-workshop-2021/Tufte/Chapter_8/
.jpg){kind=link}
