#envisioninginformation

The map [Tokyo Prefecture. Musashino, Ueno Park, Kurumazaka area (Tokyo, 1884)] exemplifies the "first rule of color composition" of the illustrious Swiss cartographer, Eduard Imhof:

Pure, bright or very strong colors have loud, unbearable effects when they stand unrelieved over large areas adjacent to each other, but extraordinary effects can be achieved when they are used sparingly on or between dull background tones.

"Noise is not music . . . only on a quiet background can a colorful theme be constructed.”

[…] color effortlessly differentiates between annotation and annotated, in this skillful industrial-strength diagram separating 300 small parts and their identifying numbers.

What matters—inevitably, unrelentingly—is the proper relationship among information layers. These visual relationships must be in relevant proportion and in harmony to the substance of the ideas, evidence, and data conveyed. "Proportion and harmony" need not be vague counsel; their meanings are revealed in the practice of detailed visual editing of data displays.

“We thrive in information-thick worlds because of our marvelous and everyday capacities to select, edit, single out, structure, highlight, group, pair, merge, harmonize, synthesize, focus, organize, condense, reduce, boil down, choose, categorize, catalog, classify, list, abstract, scan, look into, idealize, isolate, discriminate, distinguish, screen, pigeonhole, pick over, sort, integrate, blend, inspect, filter, lump, skip, smooth, chunk, average, approximate, cluster, aggregate, outline, summarize, itemize, review, dip into, flip through, browse, glance into, leaf through, skim, refine, enumerate, glean, synopsize, winnow the wheat from the chaff, and separate the sheep from the goats.

Visual displays rich with data are not only an appropriate and proper complement to human capabilities, but also such designs are frequently optimal. If the visual task is contrast, comparison, and choice—asso often it is —then the more relevant information within eyespan, the better. Vacant, low-density displays, the dreaded posterization of data spread over pages and pages, require viewers to rely on visual memory—a weak skill—to make a contrast, a comparison, a choice.

[…] Showing complexity is hard work. Detailed micro/macro designs are difficult to produce, imposing substantial costs for data collection, illustration, custom computing, image processing, production, and fine printing — expenses similar to that of first-class cartography[…].”

Each at least as big as this drawing of the earth, some 7,000 pieces of space debris — operating and dead satellites, explosion fragments from rocket engines, garbage bags and frozen sewage dumped by astronauts, shrapnel from anti satellite weapons tests, 34 nuclear reactors and their fuel cores, an escaped wrench and a toothbrush — now orbit our world. Only about 5 percent are working satellites. […] The volume of debris has doubled about every 5 years;

[1] Donald J. Kessler and Burton G. Cour- Palais, "Collision Frequency of Artificial Satellites: The Creation of a Debris Belt," Journal of Geophysical Research, 83 (June 1, 1978), 2637-2646; 

[…] this train schedule positions the individual departure times so that they add up to a frequency distribution. For trains that run often, leading hour-digits need not be repeated over and over, and, instead, minutes can be stacked.

[1] Keihin Express Line at Yokohama Station, Sagami Tetsudo Company, 1985 timetable, p. 76. Encodings indicate types of trains (super express, commuter, and so on) and various local stops.

These extraordinary statistical maps report data for thousands of tiny grid squares (1 km on a side).

[1] Map of Tokyo shows population density; note smaller concentrations dotting the tracks radiating from the city, as people cluster along rail lines and station stops. At this level of detail, residents can find their own particular square and also see it in a broader context.

R. A. Matula, "Electrical Resistivity of Copper, Gold, Palladium, and Silver,"Jour- nal of Physical and Chemical Reference Data, 8 (1979), 1162;

C. Y. Ho, R. W. Powell, and P. E. Liley, Thermal Conductivity of the Elements. Journal of Physical and Chemical Reference Data, 3 (1974), pp. 1-151, 1-244.