Project Composition
Among the many uses of charts is illustrating data composition. Chart composition is a part-to-whole relationship. It is essential to consider the right chart type before starting a composition. Selecting the right charts means that you have to consider the variables that need to be presented, the number of data points that should be displayed, and the scale of the axis (Segel & Heer, 2010). Pie charts are the most used charts in data composition; however, other types of charts can also be used. The type of chart to use in data composition depends on the nature of data. Pie charts and donut charts are effective in simple data sets, while other charts, such as area charts can be used for dense data sets to illustrate composition. In this scenario, a treemap or a sunburst will be effective because the set is hierarchical.
A sunburst chart is more or nested donut charts. The chart is a comprehensive approach to show a senior-minor relationship. The chart will help junior employees to identify its contents; however, it will not include a lot of content because it can be too busy thus less appealing.
The second option that will be used is the treemap which also, like the sunburst, visualizes the composition of a dense dataset. Although the sunburst and treemap charts are used to display nested datasets, they both have their advantages and limitations. When the sunburst cart is used, readers can quickly identify all the important details. Additionally, a sunburst is an ideal static chart. However, if I will use the sunburst, I will need more space because the chart requires a large area to display the contents.
On the contrary, with the treemap chart, I can work with limited space (Long et al., 2017). This type of chart also gives readers an opportunity to explore data so as to acquire additional insights. The drill-down feature of a treemap ensures it achieves these. The treemap chart is also easy to read; however, its power is not paralleled as an interactive chart.
If using the treemap to present data composition, I will focus on adding interactivity so that I can create a detailed view of the data. Interactivity is also vital in drilling through the hierarchies, such as expanding from regional to international markets as the business grows. I will also ensure that there are no aspects that can lead to the misinterpretation of my data composition analysis. Therefore, I will uses a small space to avoid incorporating a lot of parts that I cannot confuse the audience.
Composition is all about making careful decisions concerning the physical attributes of a visual property and its relationship. The decisions are made to ensure optimum readability is achieved and the meaning of the overall property is portrayed (Kirk, 2016). Composition forms the final layer of the design anatomy; however, that does not make it less important than other layers of the design workflow. Composition is a vital component of all designs disciplines.
All visual assets, including charts, interactive controls, and annotations occupy space (Sadiku et al., 2016). This means I will have to judge the most appropriate way to use the available space in terms of position, size, and shape of visible properties. In most scenarios, these dimensions depend on each other; therefore, they cannot be separated.
Looking into project composition, it involves defining the layout and hierarchy of a visualization project. I will have to identify all the influencing factors and the considerations under which these factors are presented because they will determine the suitability of the composition choices.
The first aspect of the composition design is based on the layout and size of the visualized content. The purpose of this is to establish a hierarchy and sequence. The visual content in this cases constitutes the charts, interactive operations, and annotation elements used.
After deciding on the content, a question comes about where it will be put, the size, and why specifically that location and size. The management will want an explanation about how the hierarchy across the view and the sequence within each view will fit into the working space. Another important thing to do is to portrays the relative importance and ensure that any available connected narrative is provided.
To answer these, I will run through the important factors that will have an impact on my decisions. However, it is essential to emphasize the fact that composition is based on common sense and involves repetition what is considered an optimum layout. There are some conventions that will not be changed. An example is the positioning of the titles, which are always the top. The introduction part is also vital, while footnotes which constitute of data sources and credits are considered the least important. The primary features can be presented first to exploit the attention that an audience can offer at the beginning of the presentation.
References
Kirk, A. (2016). Data Visualisation: A Handbook for Data Driven Design. Thousand Oaks,
CA: Sage Publications, Ltd.
Long, K.L. & Hui, C.L. et al. (2017). A Study on the Effectiveness of Tree-Maps as Tree
Visualization Techniques. Procedia Computer Science, 124, 108-115.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.procs.2017.12.136
Segel, E. & Heer, J. (2010). UW Interactive Lab Paper. Narrative Visualization: Telling IEEE
Trans. Visualization & Comp. Graphics (Proc. InfoVis).
Sadiku, O.N.M., Shadare, E, A., Musa, M, S., & Akujuobi, C. (2016). Data Visualization.