Visualmotive Blog

Thoughts on maps and visualization

Topologies of Linux and E. coli Control Networks

Comparing genomes to computer operating systems in terms of the topology and evolution of their regulatory control networks

A comparison of the Linux call graph hierarchy with the E. coli regulatory network. Researchers at Yale discovered that the Linux control structure is top-heavy, with a few common modules reused often. E coli, by contrast, has limited central control with many specialized “workers” at the bottom of the hierarchy.

Continue reading »   Jun 12, 2010Leave a comment

Designing with Forces

A great talk about Christopher Alexander’s Notes on the Synthesis of Form.

Continue reading »   Jun 4, 2010Leave a comment

The Design of Design

In the tradition of  Notes on the Synthesis of Form, Frederick Brooks takes aim at the problem facing every engineer and designer: how do you architect and build a complex system? The question is especially pertinent to computer scientists and programmers. Included here are a few notes and observations from the book.

Continue reading »   Jun 1, 2010Leave a comment

Mapping US Counties with Cartographer.js

Map of California County Populations produced with Cartographer.js

The most recent release of Cartographer.js supports county-level choropleth maps. This was the number one requested feature for Cartographer and I am delighted to finally be able to offer it in an official package. Counties are stored with efficient polygon encoding, and are easily referenced by name.

Continue reading »   May 4, 20103 Comments

Walk or Bus? iPhone app

Walk or Bus? iPhone app

Our popular Walk or Bus chart is now an iPhone application. The app allows you to enter a travel distance as well as the time until the next bus, and the application will estimate whether you could travel faster by walking or by waiting for the bus. All estimates can be tweaked to match your walking speed, your city’s average block size, and bus speeds.

Continue reading »   Feb 25, 2010Leave a comment

Color Sorting – Python source code

I have had several requests for the Color Sorting code I used to create these images. The pixel-based color sorting uses linear and Hilbert sorting techniques in RGB, YIQ, and HSV color spaces. ColorSorting is now on Github.

Continue reading »   Feb 3, 2010Leave a comment

Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud

The process of writing comics

“Comics are juxtaposed pictorial and other images in a deliberate sequence, intended to convey information and/or produce an aesthetic response in the viewer.” These are my notes from Scott McCloud’s excellent book Understanding Comics.

Continue reading »   Dec 9, 2009Leave a comment

Notes on Color

Munsell Color Space. Image created with POV-Ray, CC license via Wikimedia Commons

Choosing colors for maps, charts, and infographics can be a difficult task. Standard software packages like Excel and Matlab have tended to offer substandard color schemes (though this is getting better) so it’s up to the designer to learn about color and apply the appropriate techniques. This post will focus on understanding color schemes for maps.

Continue reading »   Dec 7, 2009Leave a comment

Cartographer.js Updates

A few quick notes regarding the latest release of Cartographer.js. Cartographer has an official Twitter channel. Follow @cartographerjs for updates. The latest version has full support for Internet Explorer (tested in IE 6+). The latest version also sports substantial speed improvements and should be easier to extend in the future.

Continue reading »   Nov 23, 2009Leave a comment

Introducing Cartographer.js

Cartographer.js screenshots: chloropleth, area-scaled circles, and pie charts

Cartographer.js is a thematic mapping library for Google Maps that simplifies the development process and provides instant access to proven visualization techniques. Developers are freed from worrying about how to tweak the Google Maps API to build the thematic elements they need, and can focus on more important problems like data collection and normalization. Cartographer.js supports custom styling so it can integrate seamlessly into existing web applications.

Continue reading »   Oct 21, 20094 Comments