Module 5: Deeper Foundations and Principles (Oct 27-Nov 7)

in Modules

We will explore the design, perceptual, cognitive, and data foundations in more depth. We will examine how the science can influence design and practice. Students will apply these ideas to analyze data and create visualizations.

Introduction

This week we will add perceptual and cognitive concepts to our list of principles (after looking at design formalisms, data formalisms, evaluation formalisms, etc.). Some of this we’ve touched on in prior weeks - and some we’ll need to push off to the future because of timing.

The Design Exercises this week are another opportunity to work with a big (big enough to be tricky) data set. We’ll compress the schedule… you’ll do exploration and “final story telling” all within the two weeks of this module. In the next module, we’ll use this data set again for examples of other types of data challenges.

We’ll also talk about glyphs as a design strategy for “medium-dimensional” data problems. (high dimensional data, that isn’t too high). We’ll talk about high-dimensional data more later, but this is a convenient time to do an in class exercise.

November 1-7 is IEEE Vis - the main academic data visualization conference. This causes a bit of a shift in schedule.

Module Learning Outcomes (Goals)

Because of various timing constraints, the lecture and assignment schedule might not align well with the learning outcomes (these topics might be covered in the weeks before and after).

  1. Describe the human visual system and identify its implications for visualization design
  2. Read empirical research and apply the findings to visualization design and analysis
  3. Identify examples of cognitive mechanisms that influence visualization effectiveness
  4. Explain the basics of the physical and perceptual aspects of color and apply this to visualization design
  5. Apply principles of perception and cognition to visualization design and analysis
  6. Practice creating and critiquing visualizations

Readings

This weeks readings cover perception topics (we had our “cognition” reading last week). If you didn’t read it, I recommend going back to it (the brief discussion in class).

I divide the perception readings into three parts, as I’d like you to get 3 different things out of it. (1) The basic ideas of perception that are applicable; (2) an overview of the results of studies (the things that you could learn from a study); and (3) an example of an actual empirical study (to see how they convey their results). And then there is a 4th topic on color (which could be a whole thing unto itself).

We could easily spend a whole semester on these topics, so it is hard to shorten this list…

Perception Basics

I really like Colin Ware’s book as an introduction to thinking about visual perception. I often recommend reading the last chapter first as it provides a summary of the rest of the book (in a way that invites you to read more), and then give some application. However, you might read the first 3 chapters instead (it’s pretty light reading):

  • (required) Colin Ware. The Dance of Meaning. Chapter 10 of Visual Thinking for Design, or Chapter 10 of the newer Visual Thinking for Information Design. (Canvas File)

    Yes, we’re reading the last chapter first. It’s basically a summary of the book, followed by the implications - which makes it a pretty self-contained introduction to the perceptual motivations of visualization. It points out some things about how we see, and then tells us how that can help us make effective visualizations. It’s an unusual, informal book (see the discussion), we’ll read more of it later in the semester.

    Note: you can read the last Chapter of either edition of the book. It’s Chapter 9 in the older edition, and Chapter 10 in the newer edition. The newer edition has a slightly different title. The canvas link is for the older edition.

  • (optional) Colin Ware. Visual Queries. Chapter 1 of Visual Thinking for Design. (Canvas File)
  • (optional) Colin Ware. What We Can Easily See. Chapter 2 of Visual Thinking for Design. (Canvas File)
  • (optional) Colin Ware. Structuring Two Dimensional Space. Chapter 3 of Visual Thinking for Design. (Canvas File)

In class, I mentioned Steve Franconeri’s way to think about how visual attention leads to a process for understanding how visualizations work. It is much better to learn it from him than me. This video is from the Open Vis Conference in 2018, but it gets the key points across.

  • (required) Steve Franconeri. Thinking with Data Visualizations, Fast and Slow. Open Vis 2018 Conference Talk. (video)

Alberto Cairo will give you his “artist/journalist” take on perception and cognition. Highly recommended. The chapter on perception is only recommended since we have enough other perception readings. The chapter on more cognitive aspects is required since we have little else on that.

Visualization Perception Results

There are a lot of papers with some perceptual result relevant to visualization. Fortunately, you don’t have to read them all because you can get surveys that tell you a lot in a little space. Pick (at least) one of these three to read quickly (don’t get too hung up on the details).

  • (alternate) Kennedy Elliot. 39 Studies about human perception in 30 minutes. Medium Posting. (url)

    This gives you the punch line of 39 different perception studies very quickly. What’s great about this is that it gets at “what can we learn from design from each of this.” While understanding the experiments is interesting (especially if you are a researcher trying to design new experiments), the basic takeaway is often what you need to influence design.

  • (alternate) Ghulam Quadri and Paul Rosen. A Survey of Perception-Based Visualization Studies by Task. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics 28, 12 (December 2022). (web pdf) (url)

    This is an excellent survey of the literature of perception research with Visualization. It is organized by what the findings are useful for. It gets a bit long, but if you skim it, it can give you a good survey of what the visualization community has looked at in terms of perceptual studies.

  • (alternate) Zehua Zeng, Leilani Battle. A Review and Collation of Graphical Perception Knowledge for Visualization Recommendation. CHI '23: Proceedings of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. (doi)

Empricial Studies Papers

I want you to read at least one “original source” paper with a perceptual study. You can pick any one.

  • (alternate) Brian D. Ondov; Fumeng Yang; Matthew Kay; Niklas Elmqvist; Steven Franconeri. Revealing Perceptual Proxies with Adversarial Examples. EEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics ( Volume: 27, Issue: 2, February 2021). (doi) (web pdf)
  • (alternate) Caitlyn M. McColeman, Fumeng Yang, Steven Franconeri, Timothy F. Brady. Rethinking the Ranks of Visual Channels. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics ( Volume: 28, Issue: 1, January 2022). (doi) (web pdf) (url)
  • (alternate) Danielle Szafir. Modeling Color Difference for Visualization Design. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics, 2018. In the Proceedings of the 2017 IEEE VIS Conference. (best paper award winner).. (doi) (web pdf)
  • (alternate) Younghoon Kim and Jeffrey Heer. Assessing Effects of Task and Data Distribution on the Effectiveness of Visual Encodings. Computer Graphics Forum 37, 3 (2018), 157–167. (doi) (web pdf)

Color

Color is such a great topic that it is hard to pick just a few things…

The first reading is a short web page with the basic ideas. The second is Munzner’s chapter (which actually talks about things beyond color). The third is a web site for you to play with color palletes to understand what we are talking about in class. The “rainbow” paper is mainly interesting for historical purposes (there are newer ones that paint a more balanced picture). I’ll stick some optional stuff in as well - especially practical advice.

  • (required) Maureen Stone. Expert Color Choices for Presenting Data. (originally a web article, but no longer online). (Canvas File)
  • (required) Tamara Munzner. Map Color and Other Channels. Chapter 10 from Munzner's Visualization Analysis & Design. (Canvas File) (UW Library)
  • (required) Cynthia Brewer and Mark Harrower. ColorBrewer 2.0. web tool. (url)
  • (optional) Borland, D., & Taylor, R.. Rainbow Color Map (Still) Considered Harmful. IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications, 27(2), 14–17. (doi)
  • (optional) Colin Ware, Maureen Stone, Danielle Albers Szafir. Rainbow Colormaps Are Not All Bad. IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications, Volume 43, Issue 3, 2023. (doi) (web pdf)
Optional readings about Color

A Design Oriented tutorial (from a designer blog)…

  • (optional) Color Theory for Designers, Part 1: The Meaning of Color. Smashing Magazine. (url)
  • (optional) Color Theory for Designers, Part 2: Understanding Concepts and Terminology. Smashing Magazine. (url)

Ware’s Chapter on it (which is more perception oriented):

  • (optional) Colin Ware. Color. Chapter 4 of Ware’s Visual Thinking for Design. (Canvas File)

Tufte is famously anti-color, except when he isn’t.

  • (optional) Eduard Tufte. Color and Information. Chapter 5 of Tufte’s Envisioning Information. (Canvas File)

Lecture Plan

  • Monday 1 (Oct 27) - Lecture: Perecption and Color Theory
  • Wednesday 1 (Oct 29) - Lecture: Perception and Color Practice; Multi-Variate Glyphs
  • Monday 2 (Nov 3) - Glyph Design ICE
  • Wednesday 2 (Nov 5) - Design Exercises Critique Session - bring designs to class

Assignments

There is one “deadline” besides the end of module deadlines: on November 5 you need to bring one of your designs for Design Exercise 5-2: Visualizations from the Flight Data to class (preferably on paper).