Tag: How To

Photo of a heron in water, catching fish with its beak.T
Christopher Laubenthal

This Analogy Explains How People Can Access Your Insights

Analogies can effectively explain complex topics in our field. The “fish in the pond" analogy shows ways to make insights more accessible.
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Kelsey Nanan

A Decade Wrapped – Plotting Nostalgia for a Data Viz Gift

Need a great gift idea? Try making a personalized data viz for that special someone.
The Double Diamond design model has four stages: Ideate, Focus, Build/Produce and Delivery. In the double diamond, there's an arrow pointing to the very center of the two diamonds, which is right between Focus and Build. The callout text explains that this is where you plan for what to do and how to tackle (at least some of) it.S
Erica Gunn

Step 7 in the Data Exploration Journey: Spin-Off Projects

With large projects, it's common to pursue spin-off ideas for the material that doesn't fit into the core project. Here are two examples.
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Claudia Berger & Chris Alen Sula

Crafting Connections: Lessons from Installing a Data Physicalization

The challenges and successes of making a physical data visualization, from initial conceptualization through installation.
Two images side by side, depicting the same event: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban meeting with Pope Francis. The left image showing the actual meeting, while the right image is a depiction generated by Midjourney AI.M
Krisztián Szabó

Making “The Pope on the Road,” an AI-Driven Interactive Site

Using ChatGPT and AI-generated images to build a scrollytelling story about Pope Francis's visit to Hungary.
Animated stacked triangle visualization showing the goal progress of a water polo matchH
Krisztina Szucs

How to Create Animated Stacked Triangle Charts Without Code

With Plot Parade you can make a stacked triangle chart without code. The tool can also turn the chart into a GIF animation. Here's how.
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Nick Desbarats

Connected Scatterplots Make Me Feel Dumb

Connected scatterplots are often used to show the relation between two variables over time. Why use them when there are better alternatives?
A group of students outside sitting around a table looking at smartphones.A
Elsa Richard

A Crowdsourced Geodata Project Is Aiding Education Efforts in Tanzania 

A geodata project helped diagnose problems with education access in Tanzania, allowing education stakeholders to devise solutions to boost school attendance.
The Double Diamond design model has four stages: Ideate, Focus, Build/Produce and Delivery. In the double diamond, there's an arrow pointing to the very center of the two diamonds, which is right between Focus and Build. The callout text explains that this is where you plan for what to do and how to tackle (at least some of) it.S
Erica Gunn

Step 6 in the Data Exploration Journey: Cut to Realistic Scope

A project to find insights from DVS's State of the Industry Survey data moves from the analysis stages to preparation for build out.
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Theresa-Marie Rhyne

The Generative AI Blues: Choosing Data Color Schemes with Adobe’s Firefly

Follow these steps to explore color choices with Adobe Firefly, a creative generative AI model. Plus: the color theory behind the process.
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Matthew Mason & Massimiliano Belli

Step Aside Line Graphs And Bar Charts! This Is a Job For Me.

If line charts and bar charts don't quite fit the data, step charts can be a great alternative. Here's a primer on when—and how to—use them.
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Prasanta Kumar Dutta

Visualising the Spread of a Hypothetical Pandemic

Creating animated globe visuals required months of exploring data, playing with D3, leveraging several graphics tools—and a few clever hacks.
Vegetables labeled as materials we use in class like "academic papers" and "podcasts"T
Amy Cesal & Amanda Makulec

Teaching the Foundations of Data Visualization 

Thinking about teaching data viz? DVS co-founders Amy Cesal and Amanda Makulec share their thoughts on developing an overview class.
yellow map showing the tour de france, but our of beer glass iconsB
Dan Petrovic

Building a Tour de France Beer Map With GPT-4: A Non-Developer’s Perspective

As a non-developer, it was challenging using GPT-4 to build a data visualization. Here are my lessons learned about working with the AI tool.
A view of the final dashboard. At the top are the filter buttons to select countries by characteristics (region or income) and a shuffle button that randomized the selection for you. Below that is the radial diagram and to its right is a dot plot, allowing for a deeper dive into the metric.F
Lindsey Poulter

Finding The Right Elements For an Award-Winning Dashboard

Lindsey Poulter won the World Data Viz Prize using a mix of dashboard features—including a shuffle button to randomize the view.
Assorted color fabric strips on a sewing table with grid and ruler.W
Teresa Hebron

Why Me? Or, How I Learned to Sew a Quilt from Ice Skating Stats

I was anxious about teaching a data viz workshop that involved data crafting. I pulled it off by transforming my favorite sport into a quilt.