Visualization & Visual Variables

Chelsea Ambler [Link]@[Link]

 Learning Goals
• Visualization
– What is it?
– Why is it useful?

• Visual Variables
– What are they?
– Why do they matter?
– What are their strengths/weaknesses?
 What is Visualization?

A visualization can be applied to many datasets.

An infographic is created for a particular dataset.
 What is Visualization?
• Visual representation of data
• “Transformation of the symbolic into the geometric”
[McCormick et al, 1987]
• “… artificial memory that best supports our natural means
of perception” [Bertin, 1967]
• “Use of computer-generated, interactive, visual
representations of data to amplify cognition”
[Card, Mackinlay, & Shneidermann, 1999]
• “The use of visual representations to explore, make sense
of, and communicate data.” [Few, 2014]
 What is Visualization?
1. Based on non-visual data
2. Produce an image
3. Result must be readable and recognizable
Robert Kosara
“The ability to take data –

to be able to understand it,

to visualize it,
to communicate it –

that’s going to be a hugely important skill in the next decades,

… because now we really do have essentially free and

ubiquitous data.

So the complimentary scarce factor is the ability to

understand the data and extract value from it.”

Hal Varian, Google’s Chief Economist

The McKinsey Quarterly, Jan 2009
 Why do we Visualize?
• Visual bandwidth is enormous
 Why do we Visualize?
• Visual bandwidth is enormous
• Human perceptual skills are remarkable
– Trend, cluster, gap, outlier, pattern ...
– Color, size, shape, proximity...
 Perception
How many 3s?
1847953212467895643
4806480328879623106
9963442681568790321
1568796512359978965
4321321549834258489
2215678656314513451
 Perception
How many 3s?
1847953212467895643
4806480328879623106
9963442681568790321
1568796512359978965
4321321549834258489
2215678656314513451
 Perception
How many s?
 Perception
How many s?
Set A Set B Set C Set D
X Y X Y X Y X Y
10 8.08 10 9.14 10 7.47 8 6.58
8 6.95 8 8.14 8 6.77 8 5.76
13 7.58 13 8.74 13 12.74 8 7.71
9 8.81 9 8.77 9 7.11 8 8.84
11 8.33 11 9.26 11 7.81 8 8.47
14 9.96 14 8.1 14 8.84 8 7.04
6 7.24 6 6.13 6 6.08 8 5.25
4 4.26 4 3.1 4 5.39 19 12.5
12 10.84 12 9.11 12 8.15 8 5.56
7 4.82 7 7.26 7 6.42 8 7.91
5 5.68 5 4.74 5 5.73 8 6.89

Anscombe’s Quartet (Anscombe, Francis J., 1973)

 Why do we Visualize?
• Visual bandwidth is enormous
• Human perceptual skills are remarkable
– Trend, cluster, gap, outlier, pattern...
– Color, size, shape, proximity...
• External representation
– Reduces load on working memory
– Offload cognition
 External Representation
Paper Mental Buffer

57
X 48
 External Representation
Paper Mental Buffer
5
57 7 * 8 = 56
X 48
6
 External Representation
Paper Mental Buffer
5
57 7 * 8 = 56
X 48 5 * 8 = 40 + 5 = 45
456
 External Representation
Paper Mental Buffer
25
57 7 * 8 = 56
X 48 5 * 8 = 40 + 5 = 45
456 4 * 7 = 28
8
 External Representation
Paper Mental Buffer
25
57 7 * 8 = 56
X 48 5 * 8 = 40 + 5 = 45
456 4 * 7 = 28
228 4 * 5 = 20 + 2 = 22
 External Representation
Paper Mental Buffer
25
57 7 * 8 = 56
X 48 5 * 8 = 40 + 5 = 45
1
456 4 * 7 = 28
228 4 * 5 = 20 + 2 = 22
2736 6+0=6
5 + 8 = 13
2+4=6+1=7
2+0=2
 External Representation
Paper Mental Buffer
25
57 7 * 8 = 56
X 48 5 * 8 = 40 + 5 = 45
456 4 * 7 = 28
1

228 4 * 5 = 20 + 2 = 22
2736 6+0=6
5 + 8 = 13
2+4=6+1=7
2+0=2
 External Representation
• Paradoxes – Lewis • Infinity – Halting problem
Carroll • Infinity – Recursion
• Paradoxes – Epimenides • Infinity – Zeno
• Paradoxes – Self-ref • Infinity – Lewis Carroll
• Paradoxes – Infinity • Zeno – Lewis Carroll
• Epimenides – Self-ref • Lewis Carroll – Wordplay
• Epimenides – Tarski • Tarski – Epimenides
• Halting Problem – • Tarski – Truth vs
Decision Procedure Provability
• Halting Problem - Turing • Tarski - Undecidability
External Representation
 Why do we Visualize?
• Visual bandwidth is enormous
• Human perceptual skills are remarkable
– Trend, cluster, gap, outlier, pattern...
– Color, size, shape, proximity...
• External representation
– Reduces load on working memory
– Offload cognition
• Fewer coded symbols to decode
 Decoding
Compare:
2947 vs 6621 vs 95.12
 Decoding
Compare:
2947 vs 6621 vs 95.12

7000

6000

5000

4000

3000

2000

1000

0
 Why we Visualize
Myths:
• To target visual learners
• To help those who are bad with numbers
• To grab attention with eye-catching displays

Stephen Few [Link]

 Why we Visualize
• See the big picture
– Don’t have read & interpret each datum on its own
• Easily & rapidly compare values
– Line graph
• See patterns among values
• Compare patterns

[Link]
 How do we Visualize?
• Know the Data
– Number of attributes, data type, quality
• Know your purpose (& audience)
– What do you/they want to see or focus on?
• Select visual variables to encode the data
– Be aware of:
• Human perceptual system
• Display capacity
• Characteristics of data (size, type)
• Task
 Visual Encoding
Data Types:

• Categorical

• Ordered
– Ordinal Small Medium Large
– Quantitative 1 2 5.29 42 101
 Visual Encoding
Marks

• what attributes can we change?

 Visual Encoding
Visual Channels:
• Position • Lightness
• Angle/Slope • Saturation Colour
• Hue

• Length • Texture
Size
• Area/Volume • Connection
• Containment
• Shape
 Visual Encoding
• Can we judge magnitude?
• Can we perceive differences?
– How many bins (differences) can we apply/perceive?
• Are channels independent?
– interference with some channels
 Visual Variable Properties
• Selective - can we pick it out of the crowd?
• Associative - can we identify groups?
• Quantitative - can we tell if one is 3X another?
• Order - can we tell order (smallest to largest)?
• Length (bins/slices) - how many differences can we see?
Is Size Selective?
find the big & small Muppets

Muppet drawings from [Link]

Is Size Associative?
find all the small Muppets

Muppet drawings from [Link]

Is Size Quantitative?
compare Kermit and Fozzie

Muppet drawings from [Link]

Is Size Quantitative?
compare Kermit and Fozzie

Muppet drawings from [Link]

Is Size Quantitative?
What value is Kermit compared to?

=
Is Size Ordered?
put the Muppets in order

Muppet drawings from [Link]

Does Size Have Length?
how many different sizes can we use/perceive?

Muppet drawings from [Link]

 Visual Variable Properties
• Selective - can we pick it out of the crowd?
• Associative - can we identify groups?
• Quantitative - can we tell if one is 3X another?
• Order - can we tell order (smallest to largest)?
• Length - how many differences can we see?
Size
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
   ~sort of  5/20
    
<5 <5 X X 5/
  X  7 / 10
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| / __   X X 4/8
  X X 
Position
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Position
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Position
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Position
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Position
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Position
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Position
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Position
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Position
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Position
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Shape
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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Shape
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<5 <5 X X 5/
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Shape
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5/
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Shape
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5/
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Shape
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Saturation/Lightness
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Saturation/Lightness
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Saturation/Lightness
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Weber’s Law: human perception is fundamentally based
on relative judgments, not absolute values.
Saturation/Lightness
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Saturation/Lightness
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Saturation/Lightness
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Saturation/Lightness
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Saturation/Lightness
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Hue
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Hue
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Hue
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Hue
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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 Destroys Detail

Image from Borland & Taylor II (2007), Rainbow Color Map (Still) Considered Harmful. IEEE Visualization Viewpoints, pp 14-17.
Rainbow

Gray

Black-Body
Radiation

Red-Green

Image from Borland & Taylor II (2007), Rainbow Color Map (Still) Considered Harmful. IEEE Visualization Viewpoints, pp 14-17.
Hue
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Hue
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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<5 <5 X X 5 /∞
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Angle
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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Angle
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Texture
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Texture
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 Visual Variable Properties
Select Associate Quantify Order Length
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Visualization Resources
Books
• Semiology of Graphics by Jacques Bertin
– The book on visual variables

• Visual Display of Quantitative Information, Beautiful Evidence,

Visual Explanations, or Envisioning Information by Edward Tufte
– Beautiful examples of historic visualizations

• Visualizing Data by Ben Fry

– Current overarching text book

• Visual Thinking for Design by Colin Ware

– Ties perception theory and design processes to visualization
practices.

• Beautiful Visualization by Steele & Iliinsky

– Combines techniques from artists, designers, scientists, and others.
Visualization Resources
Web Sites
• New York Times
– Dedicated team producing exceptional work.

• Information aesthetics
– Creative design applied to visualization. Gorgeous.

• Eagereyes
– Vis Researcher with criticism as well as overview from assorted research
conferences.

• Gapminder
– Hans Rosling’s stat software & data.

• Visual Business Intelligence

– Analytics blog, frequently discussing big data and dashboard design.

• Tableau Viz of the Day

– Daily example of a visualization created with Tableau software.

[Link]
 Sketching Exercise
• Create a visualization

• Anything you want

– What interests you in the data?
– What questions do you have?

• Challenge: Try to encode as many

properties as possible in your
visualization.
 How Do We Visualize?
• Know the Data
– Number of attributes
– Date types: ordinal vs ordered (ordinal or quantitative)
– Trustworthiness: bad fields, inaccuracies, missing values
• Know your purpose (& audience)
– What do you/they want to see?
– What might you/they want to focus on?

• Decide how to use the visual variables to encode

the data
– Requires awareness of:
• Human perceptual system
• Display capacity
• Characteristics of data (size, type)
• Task
 Variable Select Associate Quantify Order Length
Size   Yes (1D), Some (2D), Not advisable (3D)  5/20
Position     Infinite
Shape <5 <5 X X 5 / Infinite
Saturation/Lightness   X  7 / 10
Hue   Not advisable Not advisable 7 / 10
| / __ Angle   X X 4/8
Texture   X X Infinite
Visualization & Visual Variables

Comments, questions, want more info?

Chelsea Ambler [Link]@[Link] @HSL

John Brosz jdlbrosz@[Link] @TFDL

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