Creating Data Visualizations for the CBC
I recently started using Processing (processing.org) at the CBC to visualize the dependencies of the content areas on projects being built by Media Ops & Technology (MO&T). Roughly speaking, MO&T builds out platform related projects and the content areas leverage the functionality of those projects to build out their sites. The previous post here was a first sketch in chalk of how a tool to visualize these dependencies might end up looking. Turns out I wasn’t too far off.
These screenshots below show the hightlighted and un-highlighted views. What isn’t shown is the interactive component that enables users to pick which content areas they want to see and then the ability to select individual projects and highlight their dependencies.
The next visualization focused on displaying the content area’s over all dependency on each Media Ops project and then normalizing the relative impact based on audience or revenue. Below is the baseline view before audience and revenue adjustments are applied. One of the benefits of this view is that it makes it easy to see where the content areas aligned in their dependence on different Media Ops projects.
There are more projects underway to help inform discussions about where and how we expend our resources.
A big thanks goes out to everyone involved in the Processing project!
The Top 50 Gawker Media Passwords - Digits - WSJ
Great use and analysis of the Gawker password database by Zach Seward of the WSJ.com.
Data Visualizations with Processing, TSU prints
This image,Tsu-20041226-005853UTC, was created shortly after the Christmas 2004 tsunami in the Indian Ocean. It was made using satellite images and population density information for the affected countries in the Indian Ocean. I wrote a program in Processing to read this data and generate the black and white representation below.
Lines representing people who died from the Tsunami are drawn from the epicentre to the earthquake to the shorelines where the tsunami landed. At the point where the inital line reaches the shoreline, a semi-circle is drawn upwards. You can make out the coastlines of Thailand and Indonesia are visible around the middle right area of the image (especially if you look at the larger size).
While this print is created by visualizing data, it is not a data vizualization in the sense that the term is currently used. It is meant to be aesthetically pleasing while still being thought provoking around a very tragic event. The print was created for a charity auction and I’m happy to report it sold very well.
This image and the Tsu Ean print (below) were created using Processing v74.
