Synopses & Reviews
Praise for
The Best American Infographics
“Represent[s] the full spectrum of the genre—from authoritative to playful.”—Scientific American
“Not only is it a thing of beauty, it’s also a good read, with thoughtful explanations of each winning graphic.”—Nature
“Information, in its raw form, can overwhelm us. Finding the visual form of data can simplify this deluge into pearls of understanding.” —Kim Rees, Periscopic
The most creative and effective data visualizations from the past year, edited by Brain Pickings creator Maria Popova
The rise of infographics across nearly all print and electronic media—from a graphic illuminating the tweets of the women of Isis to a memorable depiction of the national geography of beer—reveals patterns in our lives and the world in often startling ways. The Best American Infographics 2015 showcases visualizations from the worlds of politics, social issues, health, sports, arts and culture, and more. From an elegant graphic comparison of first sentences in classic novels to a startling illustration of the world’s deadliest animals, “You’ll come away with more than your share of . . . mind-bending moments—and a wide-ranging view of what infographics can do” (Harvard Business Review).
“This is what information design does at its best – it gives pause, makes visible the unsuspected yet significant invisibilia of life, and by astonishing us into mobilization, it catapults us toward one of the greatest feats of human courage: the act of changing one’s mind.”—from the Introduction by Maria Popova
Guest introducer MARIA POPOVA is the one-woman curation machine behind Brain Pickings, a cross-disciplinary blog showcasing content that makes people smarter. She has more than half a million monthly readers and over 480,000 Twitter followers. Popova is an MIT Futures of Entertainment Fellow and has written for the New York Times, Atlantic, Wired UK, GOOD Magazine, The Huffington Post, and the Nieman Journalism Lab.
Series editor GARETH COOK is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist, a contributor to the New York Times Magazine, and the editor of Mind Matters, Scientific American’s neuroscience blog. He helped invent the Boston Globe’s Sunday Ideas section and served as its editor from 2007 to 2011. His work has also appeared in NewYorker.com, WIRED, Scientific American, and The Best American Science and Nature Writing.
Review
“Not only is it a thing of beauty, it’s also a good read, with thoughtful explanations of each winning graphic."
—Nature
“You’ll come away with more than your share of…mind-bending moments – and a wide ranging view of what infographics can do.”
—Harvard Business Review
"Represents the full spectrum of the genre – from authoritative to playful.”
—Scientific American
"A stunning collection. . . . I learned something new from each entry." —Kelly Krause, Nature
“Infographics have this wonderful ability to inspire people to act and get involved.”
—Karl De Torres
“Information, in its raw form, can overwhelm us. Finding the visual form of data can simplify this deluge into pearls of understand.”
—Kim Rees
Review
"Not only is it a thing of beauty itand#8217;s also a good read, with thoughtful explanations of each winning graphic and an entertaining forward by David Byrne."
and#8212;Nature
Synopsis
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, etc 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.
Synopsis
Practical data design tips from a data visualization expert of the modern ageData doesn?t decrease; it is ever-increasing and can be overwhelming to organize in a way that makes sense to its intended audience. Wouldn?t it be wonderful if we could actually visualize data in such a way that we could maximize its potential and tell a story in a clear, concise manner? Thanks to the creative genius of Nathan Yau, we can. With this full-color book, data visualization guru and author Nathan Yau uses step-by-step tutorials to show you how to visualize and tell stories with data. He explains how to gather, parse, and format data and then design high quality graphics that help you explore and present patterns, outliers, and relationships.
- Presents a unique approach to visualizing and telling stories with data, from a data visualization expert and the creator of flowingdata.com, Nathan Yau
- Offers step-by-step tutorials and practical design tips for creating statistical graphics, geographical maps, and information design to find meaning in the numbers
- Details tools that can be used to visualize data-native graphics for the Web, such as ActionScript, Flash libraries, PHP, and JavaScript and tools to design graphics for print, such as R and Illustrator
- Contains numerous examples and descriptions of patterns and outliers and explains how to show them
Visualize This demonstrates how to explain data visually so that you can present your information in a way that is easy to understand and appealing.
Synopsis
See your data in new waysOur world is awash in data. To mean anything, it must be presented in a way that enables us to interpret, analyze, and apply the information. One of the best ways to do that is visually.
Nathan Yau is a pioneer of this innovative approach. In this book, he offers you dozens of ideas for telling your story with data presented in creative, visual ways. Open the book, open your mind, and discover an almost endless variety of ways to give your data new dimensions.
Learn to present data with visual representations that allow your audience to see the unexpected
Find the stories your data can tell
Explore different data sources and determine effective formats for presentation
Experiment with and compare different visualization tools
Look for trends and patterns in your data and select appropriate ways to chart them
Establish clear goals to guide your visualizations
Visit the companion web site at www.wiley.com/go/visualizethis for code samples, data files you can download, and interactive examples to show you how visualization works
Synopsis
A fresh and visually arresting addition to the acclaimed Best American series, showcasing the finest examples of data visualization from the past year, guest edited by Nate Silver.
Synopsis
Year two of this fresh, timely, beautiful addition to the Best American series, introduced by Nate Silver The rise of infographics across virtually all print and electronic media reveals patterns in our lives and worlds in fresh and surprising ways. As we find ourselves in the era of big data, where information moves faster than ever, infographics provide us with quick, often influential bursts of art and knowledge — to digest, tweet, share, go viral. Best American Infographics 2014 captures the finest examples, from the past year, of this mesmerizing new way of seeing and understanding our world. Guest introducer Nate Silver brings his unparalleled expertise and lively analysis to this visually compelling new volume.
Synopsis
The latest addition to the celebrated Best American series, featuring the most creative and effective visualizations of data from the past year, guest edited by Brain Pickings’ creator Maria Popova.
Synopsis
The newest volumeand#8212;fresh and visually arrestingand#8212;in the acclaimed Best American series, showcasing the finest examples of data visualization fromand#160;the past year
Synopsis
The rise of infographics across virtually all print and electronic mediaand#8212;from a striking breakdown of classic cocktails to a graphic tracking 200 influential moments that changed the world to visually arresting depictions of Twitter trafficand#8212;reveals patterns in our lives and our world in fresh and surprising ways. In the era of big data, where information moves faster than ever, infographics provide us with quick, often influential bursts of art and knowledgeand#8212;on the environment, politics, social issues, health, sports, arts and culture, and moreand#8212;to digest, to tweet, to share, to go viral.
The Best American Infographics captures the finest examples from the past year, including the ten best interactive infographics, of this mesmerizing new way of seeing and understanding our world.
Synopsis
The most creative and effective data visualizations from the past year, edited by Brain Pickings’ creator Maria Popova. “Not only is [The Best American Infographics] a thing of beauty, it’s also a good read.” — Nature
The rise of infographics across nearly all print and electronic media—from a graphic illuminating the Tweets of the women of Isis to a memorable graph of the national geography of beer—reveals patterns in our lives and the world in often startling ways. The Best American Infographics 2015 showcases visualizations from the worlds of politics, social issues, health, sports, arts and culture, and more. From an elegant graphic comparison of first sentences in classic novels to an incisive illustration of the crash record of drones, “You’ll come away with more than your share of . . . mind-bending moments—and a wide-ranging view of what infographics can do” (Harvard Business Review). Guest editor Maria Popova is famous for posting new content to her massively popular blog Brain Pickings at least three times a day. Her unique insight into today’s need to represent data visually so it can be digested—and shared—faster than ever before makes her another brand-enhancing curator for this Best American bestseller.
About the Author
Series editor GARETH COOK is a Pulitzer Prizeandndash;winning journalist, a contributor to the
New York Times Magazine, and the editor of andquot;Mind Matters,andquot;andnbsp;
Scientific Americanand#39;s neuroscience blog. He helped invent the
andnbsp;Boston Globeandrsquo;s Sundayandnbsp;Ideas section and served as its editor from 2007 to 2011. His work has also appeared in
NewYorker.com,andnbsp;
Wired,andnbsp;
Scientific American, andandnbsp;
The Best American Science andandnbsp;
Nature Writing.andnbsp;
DAVID BYRNEandnbsp;is a renowned artist, the force behindandnbsp;the Talking Heads and creator of the highly regarded record label Luaka Bop. He is a photographer, film director, and author.
Table of Contents
Introduction.
1 Telling Stories with Data.
More Than Numbers.
What to Look For.
Design.
Wrapping Up.
2 Handling Data.
Gather Data.
Formatting Data.
Wrapping Up.
3 Choosing Tools to Visualize Data.
Out-of-the-Box Visualization.
Programming.
Illustration.
Mapping.
Survey Your Options.
Wrapping Up.
4 Visualizing Patterns over Time.
What to Look for over Time.
Discrete Points in Time.
Continuous Data.
Wrapping Up.
5 Visualizing Proportions.
What to Look for in Proportions.
Parts of a Whole.
Proportions over Time.
Wrapping Up.
6 Visualizing Relationships.
What Relationships to Look For.
Correlation.
Distribution.
Comparison.
Wrapping Up.
7 Spotting Differences.
What to Look For.
Comparing across Multiple Variables.
Reducing Dimensions.
Searching for Outliers.
Wrapping Up.
8 Visualizing Spatial Relationships.
What to Look For.
Specific Locations.
Regions.
Over Space and Time.
Wrapping Up.
9 Designing with a Purpose.
Prepare Yourself.
Prepare Your Readers.
Visual Cues.
Good Visualization.
Wrapping Up.
Index.