Drucker prefaces her second chapter, "Interpreting Visualization :: Visualizing Interpretation," with the concept that every visualization can be categorized as either representations or knowledge generators. The difference is representations are of information that is already known, whereas knowledge generators create new information through their use. This is important context as we…

Intro -> Image, Interpretation, and Interface -> WindowsThrough the first section of her book, Drucker provides us with a crash course in the evolution of visual imagery as a legitimate form of communication design. She highlights how, from the beginning, design has been fighting to be taken seriously…

In his blog series and video talk on encoding data through color, Robert Simmon makes a strong case for strategic uses of color in visualizations based on how humans perceive color– both technically and culturally. As we learn, this often means throwing away the rainbow scale in favor of a…

Healy's Look at Data: What Makes Bad Figures BadSometimes we look at an infographic and we know it's bad right away. But why? Healy calls out the importance of distinguishing the badness of a figure into three separate but useful categories:AestheticSimplicity and the removal of superfluous aesthetic junk is…