Data Visualization
Brittany Fong
bfongdata.com
Why data viz?
Data Viz Tools
PowerBI
Question
Data
Audience
Creation
Building a data viz
Start with a question
What is the purpose/goal of the visualization?
What questions are the visualizations going to answer?
How should people feel?
What data do you have?
Is there a unique identifier?
What level of detail is the data at?
Do you need to bring in additional data/tables?
What is the quality of the data?
Cater to your audience
What level of detail do they want to see?
How complex can the visualizations be?
Create a sketch
Pull out a pencil and paper to get the ideas flowing
How will the visualization be viewed? (mobile, print, web)
Data Visualization Best Practices
Why are best practices important?
So we don't end up here!
viz.wtf
Ease of Understanding
Make the visualization as easy as possible to read and understand
Axes
Keep axes clear and consistent
Avoid skipping numbers and Always start from 0
Color
Accessibility - Color Blind (508 Compliant) and make sure your colors have enough contrast (black and white print out)
Clear Labels
Titles, sub-titles, axes, legends, data source, outliers (if necessary)
Try the 30 second test
Context
How do I know if this number is good or bad? I need some sort of reference.
vs
Keep it simple
Don't add colors when it's not necessary
If it doesn't help explain the visual get rid of it
Don't add too many labels
Check your work
Does the visualization logically make sense? If you must use a pie chart it better add up to 100%
Use the right graph
Jon Schwabish's Graphic Continuum
What can I do?
Style Guides with Brand compliant color palettes
Example Dashboards
Title Text
Lindsey Poulter @datavizlinds
Marc Soares @marc_soares
Chantilly Jaggernauth @chanjagg
Data Visualization Resources
Color palettes
pinterest.com
colorbrewer2.org
color.adobe.com
vischeck.com
Data wrangling
Tableau Prep
Data viz examples and information
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Dear Data (dear-data.com)
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Makeover Monday (http://www.makeovermonday.co.uk/)
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Flowing Data (flowingdata.com)
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The Functional Art (http://www.thefunctionalart.com/)
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Storytelling with Data (http://www.storytellingwithdata.com/gallery/)
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Tableau Public (public.tableau.com)
Data viz resources
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Tableau Website Training Videos
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(https://www.tableau.com/learn/training)
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Tableau Community (forums, knowledge base, white papers)
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https://www.tableau.com/learn/training
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Tableau User Groups (local, internal, and subject specific)
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dctug.com
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Twitter