infographics

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with infographics

Design History

A Trio of Visual Catalogs Celebrates the Innovative Figures Who Pioneered Modern Information Graphics

A new book set honors the lives and legacies of three figures who fundamentally altered the way we communicate and organize data still today. Information Graphic Visionaries is a catalog trio dedicated to educator and entrepreneur Emma Willard, statistician and founder of modern nursing Florence Nightingale, and scientist Étienne-Jules Marey, who all brought insight and clarity to the modern world by conveying complex information in visually compelling and convincing manners. Edited by RJ Andrews of Info We Trust with art direction by Lorenzo Fanton, the series unveils these previously overlooked histories through newly discovered graphics and prominent works paired with contextual essays and annotations.

Through a combination of atlases, wall hangings, and textbook woodcut graphics, Emma Willard: Maps of History explores how Willard invented new conceptions of time and ultimately defined chronology in the United States. Florence Nightingale: Mortality & Health Diagrams contains the nurses’ persuasive designs that ultimately sparked vital reforms to the English health care system. And the Étienne-Jules Marey volume is the first English translation of the French scientist’s seminal text on data visualization, The Graphic Method, La Méthode Graphique, which was first published in 1885.

After launching May 11, Information Graphic Visionaries is already nearing its goal on Kickstarter, but you still have time to back the project.

 

Design

A Chart Chronicles the Colors of Mister Rogers’ Cardigans from 1969 to 2001

It’s a beautiful day for a chronological look at the colorful range of cardigans beloved television host Fred Rogers slipped on during each episode of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. Starting with blue near the beginning of the show’s run—the soft-spoken icon seems to have favored more pastels during these early days—the chart spans all the way to the red he wore for his last airing on August 31, 2001. Rogers’ legacy is synonymous with the cozy garment, many of which were hand-knitted by his mother. One is part of the collection at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History.

Pick up a print of the graph, which was created by Owen Phillips who runs the data-centric F5 Newsletter in honor of Rogers’ birthday on March 20, from the F5 shop. (via Laughing Squid)

Design History Illustration Music

Inside Information: Cross-Sections of Retro Technology Reveal Historical Moments of Iconic Objects

As part of an ongoing series titled Inside Information, U.K.-based design studio Dorothy explores some of the most iconic designs in the areas of film, music, personal computing, and fashion through clever “cutaway” infographics. Each illustration reveals a miniature isometric world packed with historical moments from famous concerts that used the Vox AC30 amplifier to films that utilized the Arriflex 35 IIC handheld camera, which transformed movies forever. All five of the Inside Information graphics are available as three-color litho prints on its website. (via Colossal Submissions)

 

Design Illustration

Using Stock Market Charts, Artist Gladys Orteza Transforms Data into Bright Nighttime Landscapes

A visual insights designer at Nike by day, Gladys Orteza spends her off-hours transforming otherwise dull stock market charts into brilliant landscapes. The dips and rises of companies like Ford, Tesla, Apple, and Disney become rocky gorges and distant city skylines. Prompted by trading practices pre-pandemic, Orteza began to envision buildings and natural features when diving into Robinhood. “I remember sitting on the couch looking at one of my stock charts and nonchalantly saying to my husband that these charts look really pretty and that I should recreate them as mountains on a landscape,” she says. These visualizations soon manifested into vivid, nature-based depictions.

The Hillsboro, Oregon-based artist, who’s been sharing her landscapes on Instagram, tells Colossal that much of her inspiration comes from living in the Pacific Northwest. “One day we were driving through farmland during a sunset, and the colors of the sky was so breathtaking I had to start drawing. I then got inspired by a few old trucks that were parked on people’s properties,” she says. That experience resulted in the pastel landscape created utilizing Ford’s chart (shown below) that has a vintage vehicle driving through the foreground.

Orteza also contradicts any notion that stocks and data are impersonal by adding important pieces of herself into each artwork. The moon radiating in the background of every piece represents her daughter named Lyanna Luna, and if you look closely at the nearby bird, you’ll see the creature actually is comprised of the artist’s signature.

To be clear, Orteza doesn’t expect her mountainous scenes or starry nights to influence trading decisions. “It’s not intended to help the viewer make any business decisions or give any technical analysis. It’s visual storytelling. It’s art,” she says. (via Kottke)

 

Craft Science

People Are Knitting, Crocheting, and Weaving Tangible Records of Temperature Changes

In an effort to make the ongoing effects of climate change more visible, needleworkers around the globe are creating temperature blankets and scarves that track local weather patterns. Earlier this month, writer Josie George began an expansive Twitter thread about the project, motivating others to share their similar work. “I decided that this year, every day, I would knit a row on a scarf to mark the corresponding daily temperature/weather of my town,” George wrote in the original post. “It felt like a good way to engage with the changing climate and with the changing year. A way to notice and not look away.”

Although the technique and materials vary, each project follows a basic pattern utilizing a key (like this free one) to track some combination of the temperature, sky conditions, season, and date. The personal projects are part of a larger movement to document micro weather changes that may serve as indicators of broader climate issues. Groups like The Tempestry Project have been crafting wallhangings tracking the daily high temperature of a specific location during the course of year, weaving the results into a yarn-based work resembling a bar graph. Check out this Instagram tag to see more of the activism-inspired projects. (via My Modern Met)

 

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A post shared by Ali (@alisblanketbox) on Jan 16, 2020 at 6:18am PST

Craft Design

A Father Transformed Data of his Son’s First Year of Sleep into a Knitted Blanket

Seung Lee tracked the first year of his baby’s sleep schedule with the BabyConnect app, which lets you export data to CSV. Choosing to work with six minute intervals, Lee then converted the CSVs into JSON (using Google Apps Script and Python) which created a reliable pattern for knitting. The frenetic lines at the top of the blanket indicate the baby’s unpredictable sleep schedule right after birth. We can see how the child grew into a more reliable schedule as the lines reach more columnar patterns.

As Lee neared completion of the blanket, he shared, “All the disparate pieces felt really fragile but as I seamed it together, wove in loose ends, and removed stitch markers, it felt more and more sturdy. Something that I’d been handling like a delicate bird egg started to just feel like a blanket.” The Seattle-based comic artist, crafter, and coder shares updates via Twitter and his website. (thnx, Jennifer!)