CO3 and CO4

Session Objective

• By the end of the session the students / audience will able to understand what is
Spatial data & Visualization approaches to represent it.

2
RECAP…

 Non-spatial Data: Data that relate to a specific, precisely defined location. The data are often
statistical but may be text, images or multi-media.

 These are linked in the GIS to spatial data that define the location.

3
Spatial Data:

 Data that define a location. These are in the form of graphic primitives that are usually either
points, lines, polygons or pixels.

 Spatial data includes location, shape, size, and orientation.

-For example, consider a particular square:
- its center (the intersection of its diagonals) specifies its location
- its shape is a square
- the length of one of its sides specifies its size
- the angle its diagonals make with, say, the x-axis specifies its orientation

4
Spatial Data:

 Spatial data includes spatial relationships.

-For example, the arrangement of ten bowling pins is spatial data.

 Spatial data has spatial information in the form of say latitude and longitude. So you can locate
the information easily.

5
The fundamental differences between Spatial and Non-spatial data is:

 Spatial data are generally multi-dimensional and auto correlated.

 Non-spatial data are generally one-dimensional and independent.

6
Why do we care about location?

 When modeling and analyzing our world, location is a critical factor.

 A non-spatial model cannot accurately reflect the processes and interactions happening in our
world.

7
Spatial data model:
The spatial data model consists of 2 parts:
- geometry
- properties

Consider the following representation of a city as a point.

{
"type": "Feature",
"geometry": { "type": "Point",
"coordinates": [ 77.58270263671875, 12.963074139604124] },
"properties": { "id": 1, "name": “Vizag" }
}

8
Map Projections and Spatial Reference System :

If there was one thing that makes spatial data ‘special’ - it would have to be Coordinate Reference System
(CRS) or Spatial Reference System (SRS).

- Global Maps
- Country Maps
- Local and Regional Maps

9
Global Maps:

 The Equal Earth projection is the preferred and most modern alternative when
creating global maps.

 Added benefit of this projection is that it preserves regions, so it's also a good choice
for research on a global scale that involves grids of the same area.

10
Country Maps:

 The majority of countries have implemented a national Coordinate Reference System

designed to reduce geographical distortions.

 For guidance you can consult the national mapping agency in the region.

 The National Spatial Framework (NSF) recommends that India use the CRS EPSG: 7755
for country-level mapping.

11
Local and Regional Maps:

 Similar to the Coordinate Reference Systems at country level, most countries have
Coordinate Reference Systems at the state / province level.

 The Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) system, which is designed to assign

coordinates to positions on the Earth's surface, provides a strong overall system that can
be used in any part of the world, without them.

 The anomalies of each region are reduced, and if the area of interest is located within the
region-this is a reasonable option for both analysis and visualisation.

12
Session Topic: Scalar Volumes, Isosurfacing,
Volume Rendering, Transfer Function Design

13
Session Objective

• By the end of the session the students / audience will able to understand what
is Volume visualization, Direct volume rendering, Transfer functions.

14
 SCALAR FIELD

 Spatial Data that define a location. It includes location, shape, size, and orientation.
 These are in the form of graphic primitives that are usually either points, lines, polygons or
pixels.
 A scalar spatial field has a single value associated with each spatially defined cell.

Example:

Fig(a): A scalar field such as temperature or pressure, where intensity of the field is represented by
different hues of colors.

15
 SCALAR FIELD
(b) Line integral of scalar field:
-A scalar field has a value associated with each space-point. In a two-dimensional field the value
can be considered as the height of a surface embedded in three dimensions at each point. The line
integral of a curve along this scalar field is equal to the area underneath a curve traced over the
field specified surface.
-
Color mapping is a common technique of scalar visualisation that maps scalar colour data and
displays colours of the computer system. The scalar mapping is implemented by indexing the
colours into a lookup table. Scalar values then act as indices in this lookup table. A variety of
colours are used in the lookup table.

-For example, a vector field in the plane can be visualised as: a series of arrows of a given
magnitude and direction, each attached to a point in the plane. For example, vector fields are also
used to model a moving fluid's speed and position in space, or the intensity and position of any
force, such as magnetic or gravitational force, as it moves from one point to another.
16
There are three major families of idioms for visually encoding scalar fields:
a) slicing

b) isocontours

c) direct volume rendering

17
Slicing:
Slicing planes are a universal tools act as simple clipping geometry to provide clear cut-away views of
the data.

-It is a difficult task to effectively view and visually analyse complex 3D data. Occlusions, overlaps, and
projective distortions

— as often caused by traditional 3D rendering techniques

— can be major obstacles to accurate and unambiguous analysis of data. Slicing planes are a
common method for solving many of these problems.

To provide direct cut-away views of the results, they act as simple clipping geometry.

18
Isosurfaces: An isosurface is a 3D surface representation of points with equal values in a 3D data
distribution. It is a surface that represents points with a constant value within a volume of space (e.g.
pressure, temperature, velocity, density); in other words, it is a level range of a continuous function
whose domain is 3D-space.

Contour plot:
-display result quantities on a series of lines
-Available for 3D and 2D plot groups
-useful for heat transfer and acoustics applications

Isosurface plots:
-display result quantities on a series of surfaces
-Available for 3D plot groups
-useful for scalar fields

19
Volume Rendering (
https://developer.nvidia.com/sites/all/modules/custom/gpugems/books/GPUGems/gpugems
_ch39.html
)
In scientific visualization, Volume rendering is a set of techniques used to display a 2D projection of a
3D discretely sampled dataset, typically a 3D scalar field. Applications: Medical Science, Engineering,
Earth sciences

Methods:
-Indirect volume rendering
• Isosurface extraction
• Data mapped to geometric primitives

-Direct volume rendering

• No need of Isosurface extraction
• Data mapped to optical properties (colore, opacity)

20
Below figure presents a volume rendering of a head dataset using the resulting 2D transfer function, showing
examples of the base materials and these three boundaries: (D) air–tissue, (E) tissue–bone, and (F) air–bone. A
cutting plane has been positioned to show the internal structure of the head.

Figure: Simian allows users to construct multidimensional

transfer functions for direct volume rendering using a derived
space. (c) Volume rendering of head dataset using the resulting
2D transfer function, showing material boundaries of (D) air–
tissue, (E) tissue– bone, and (F) air–bone. From [Kniss et al.
05, Figure 9.1].

21
Transfer function :

Finding the right transfer function manually often requires considerable trial and error because
features of interest in the spatial field can be difficult to isolate: uninteresting regions in space
may contain the same range of data values as interesting ones.

22
Direct Volume Rendering

Direct Volume Rendering methods produce images of a 3D volumetric data set without extracting geometric
surfaces directly from the data.

These techniques use an optical model to map data characteristics, such as colour and opacity, to optical
properties.

Optical properties are accumulated along each viewing ray during rendering to form an image of the data.

If we apply conventional animation techniques directly to DVR videos, such as image blending, we can not get
right depth indications and some misleading information will be added.

There are two animation methods to solve these issues , i.e. the image-centric method and the data-centric
method.

In image-centric process, image blending synthesises the intermediate frames of any two successive
keyframes.
23
A realistic solution for simple volumetric data and low-end platforms is given by the image-centric approach.
Since volume rendering operations are nonlinear, however, the image blending method may fail for complex
data.

Therefore a data-centric approach for high-end applications is implemented.

The intermediate frames are all made direct volume in our data centric system to expose complex structures
and guarantee accurate depth indications.

24
 Vector Fields:

A vector valued function that assigns a vector (with direction and magnitude) to any given point.

25
Session Objective

• By the end of the session the students will able to understand what is a Scalar
and Vector fields and their characteristics.

26
27
28
Direct Visualization of Vector Fields

29
30
31
Geometric Flow

32
 Integral curves play an important role in visualizing the associated vector field and in
understanding the underlying physics of the flow.

 In steady flows, pathlines, streamlines, and streaklines are identical. When the vector field depends
explicitly on time, these curves are distinct from one another.

33
Texture-Based Methods

34
Spot Noise

• Idea: distribute a set of intensity functions (spots) over domain

• Each spot represents a particle warped over a small time step
• Streak in the direction of local flow from where the particle is seeded
• Repeat for many spots, and then blend together
• Different textures can be created using different spot shapes
• Aligning the shape of the spot with the direction of flow gives a good visualization effect:
• In direction of flow, scale proportional to (1 + |v|), where |v| = velocity magnitude
• At 90 degrees to flow, scale proportional to 1 / (1 + |v|)

35
Feature-Based Methods
Feature Extraction

●Features:
●Represent interesting structures or objects in the data
●Extract and visualize them
●The original (large) field is not needed anymore for visualization
●Extraction can (usually) be automated
●Rendering is fast and (usually) interactive
●Medium to high cognitive load

●Typical features:
●Topological features
●Vortices
●Shock waves
●Extremal structures

36
 Spatial Uncertainty
Web data visualization

37
Session Objective:

At the conclusion of this session, student will be able to understand spatial modern web-
based environment

38
Objective :

How can uncertainty information in higher-dimensional datasets produced by spatio-temporal

environmental models be represented and visualized effectively in a modern web-based
environment?

39
 -MacEachren et al . ( 2005) notes that "information uncertainty is a dynamic term with multiple
meanings across knowledge domains and application contexts."

 Uncertainty requires an accumulation of other principles of data quality such as imprecision,

inaccuracy, inconsistency, noise, ambiguity and lack of reliability (Pang 2008).

 As such, there is no widely accepted concept of uncertainty but such a concept is easier to
formulate in the context of this study, the visualisation of uncertainty for spatio-temporal data.

 -Uncertainty sources Wittenbrink et al . ( 1995), Pang et al . ( 1997), and Pang (2008) use an
uncertainty visualisation pipeline that explains the processes and stages involved in spatial data
visualisation and its associated uncertainty.

 At different stages (acquisition, development, and visualisation) confusion is introduced along the
pipeline, and then propagated towards the end of the pipeline where visualisation and analysis
take place.

40
Web structure data and web usage data

References for Sources of Uncertainty:

- Wittenbrink, C.M., Pang, A.T., Lodha, S. (1995) Verity Visualization: Visual Mappings. Technical Report
UCSC-CRL-95-48, Computer and Information Science Dept., University of Californica at Santa Cruz,
USA.

- Pang, A.T., Wittenbrink C.M., Lodha, S.K. (1997) Approaches to uncertainty visualization. The Visual
Computer 1997(13): 370-390.

- Pang, A.T. (2008) Visualizing Uncertainty in Natural Hazards, in Bostrom, A., French, S., Gottlieb, S.
(eds) Risk Assessment, Modeling and Decision Support. Springer-Verlag, Berlin.

- -Longley, P.A., Goodchild, M.F. (2005) Geographical information systems and science. Wiley,
Chichester.

41
42
Sources Longley and Goodchild (2005 ) added description at the start of the pipeline, resulting in a
simulation pipeline (Figure) identifying four stages in which ambiguity can be introduced

-Interpretation. The first step in the process of visualisation is to interpret the natural phenomenon.
Often our understanding of natural processes isn't complete, and at this point confusion or lack of
information can lead to uncertainty.

-Acquisition. There is experimental variability in the measurement of results. The observed

phenomenon may therefore not be accurately described by measured data, or data generated as a result
of numerical modelling.

43
-Transformation.

 Transformations occur as data is interpolated, resampled, rescaled, during format transformations

or when algorithms are used to extract new data (Pang et al . 1997).
 Transformations may take place at the stage of development, but also as far back as the stage of
visualisation.
 In the visualisation level, ambiguity may also be added. Rendering algorithms, visual sign
limitations, or image quality may generate uncertainty at the visualisation level.

- The introduction of uncertainty in the visualisation pipeline is exacerbated by the issue that
uncertainty will spread and impact successive stages of the pipeline (Wittenbrink et al . 1996).

44
Properties of Geospatial Data :

An overview of the properties of geospatial data 45

on attribute uncertainty in scalar raster datasets.
Properties of Geospatial Data :

-Uncertainty in geospatial datasets is defined across a range of data formats, data types, and
various aspects of data quality. As is shown in Figure, only datasets in a raster format with scalar
attribute values will be included.

46
Session Topic: Web content data multimedia data
visualization

47
 Web content data multimedia data
Web distributed system

48
The growing demand for World Wide Web ( WWW) services has made caching of documents a
requirement for reducing download times and reducing Internet traffic.

In order to use caching efficiently, an informed decision must be taken as to which documents
are to be removed from the cache in the event of cache saturation.

This is especially important in a wireless network, where the size of the Network terminal client
cache is limited.

49
The World Wide Web (or Web for short) is very popular and is being used by people all over the
world.
However‚ its utility is being threatened by its ever growing popularity. The WWW has
experienced a dramatic increase in popularity.
Many reports indicate that its growth will continue at an exponential rate. Some of the main
reasons for which a user would opt for Web caching includes:
 To increase the bandwidth availability by curbing the transmission of redundant
data.
 For reducing network congestion.
 For improving response times

50
Architecture Aspects :-
i) Brower caching :- A browser first look for object in cache before requesting to website. Caching frequently
used Web objects speeds up web surfing.

ii) Proxy Caching :- Proxies serve hundreds and thousands. Because of proxy caches aren’t part of the client or
origin server.

iii) Reverse proxy caching :- Typically, reverse proxies are used in front of Web servers. All connections
Coming from the Internet addressed to one of the Web servers are routed through proxy server.

51
 Query The web search engine crawling softwares gathers all the data extensively related to the user query
expansion The web crawling process begins with the spiders going to a list of past web addresses from past
Keyword crawls and sitemaps provided by website owners.
When spiders visit the website, they use the links on those websites to link to other pages.
After retrieving information from websites, crawlers store organize the available data (billions of web

Procedure for Image Indexing

pages) into Search Index.
In this process search engines uses the knowledge graph for searching into other sorts of similar
images along with keyword information.

Search engine criteria for selecting a single image

out of total 30 images
Google Images
Extract the first (i) Most frequent URL hosted in
10 image links of all the search engines
Yahoo Image Search Raw HTML each search
access engine & (ii) Great composition
Bing Image Feed
download (iii) Highest frequency

Selected image
for an indexing
52
 An image indexing required image dataset.
 For the collection of public domain images, we employed top 3 image search engines in the world such as
Google, Yahoo and Bing. Keywords are used manually as a “user query”.
 However, as per the need for the better retrieval performance, query expansion process has been
used. Next, the automatic system module performs the following tasks for selecting an image for an indexing.
 Based on the indexing the text around a keyword and the image file
name, web search engine crawling softwares gathers all the data extensively related to the user query.
 It also tries to contextualize the user query to the best of its abilities.
 The web crawling process begins with the spiders going to a list of past web addresses from past crawls and
sitemaps provided by website owners.
 When spiders visit the website, they use the links on those websites to link to other pages. After retrieving
information from websites, crawlers store organize the available data (billions of web pages) into Search
Index.
 In this process search engines uses the knowledge graph for searching into other sorts of similar
images along with keyword information.
53
 Every search engine follows their own page rank algorithms. This ranking sorts through the pages stored in
the search index to deliver the best possible results that are relevant to the searched keyword.
 Web content data multimedia data visualization

Web content mining multimedia:

-SKICAT
-Color histogram matching
-Multimedia miner
-Shot boundary detection

60
61
62
63
64
What Is a Dashboard?
A dashboard is a visual display of the most important information needed to achieve one or
more objectives; consolidated and arranged on a single screen so the information can be
monitored at a glance.
• Just as the dashboard of a car provides critical information needed to operate the vehicle at a glance, a BI dashboard
serves a similar purpose, whether you're using it to make strategic decisions for a huge corporation, run the daily
operations of a team, or perform tasks that involve no one but yourself.

• The means is a single‐screen display, and the purpose is to efficiently monitor the information needed to achieve
one's objectives.
Cont..
• Salient feature of Dashboard –

• Dashboards display the information needed to achieve specific objectives.

• A dashboard fits on a single computer screen.

• Must the information be displayed in a web browser?

• Dashboards are used to monitor information at a glance.

Categorizing Dashboards
Variable Values
Strategic
Role
Analytical
Operational
Type of data Quantitative
Non‐quantitative
Sales
Finance
Data domain
Marketing
Manufacturing
Balanced Scorecard (for example, KPIs)
Type of measures Six Sigma
Non‐performance
Enterprise‐wide
Span of data Departmental
Individual
Cont..
Variable Values
Monthly
Weekly
Update frequency Daily
Hourly
Real time or near real time
Static display
Interactivity
Interactive display (drill-down, filters, etc.)
Primarily graphical
Mechanisms of display
Primarily text
Conduit to additional data
Portal functionality
No portal functionality
Classifying Dashboards by Role
• one of the most useful ways to categorize a dashboard.
• The breakdown of dashboards into three roles (strategic, analytical, and operational) is
certainly not the only way to express the types of business activities a dashboard can
support.
• Dashboards for strategic purposes - The primary use of dashboards today is for strategic
purposes.
• The popular "executive dashboard," and most of the dashboards that support managers at any level in an
organization, are strategic in nature.
• They provide the quick overview that decision makers need to monitor the health and opportunities of the
business.
• Dashboards of this type focus on high‐level measures of performance, including forecasts to light the path into
the future.
• Although these measures can benefit from contextual information to clarify the meaning, such as comparisons
to targets and brief histories, along with simple evaluators of performance (for example, good and bad), too
much information of this type or too many subtle gradations can distract from the primary and immediate goals
of the strategic decision maker.
Cont..
• Dashboards for analytical purposes - Dashboards that support data analysis require a
different design approach.
• In these cases the information often demands greater context, such as rich comparisons, more
extensive history, and subtler performance evaluators.
• Like strategic dashboards, analytical dashboards also benefit from static snapshots of data that are
not constantly changing from one moment to the next.
• However, more sophisticated display media are often useful for the analyst who must examine
complex data and relationships and is willing to invest the time needed to learn how they work.
• Analytical dashboards should support interactions with the data, such as drilling down into the
underlying details, to enable the exploration needed to make sense of it that is, not just to see what
is going on but to examine the causes.
• For example, it isn't enough to see that sales are decreasing; when your purpose is analysis, you
must be made aware of such patterns so that you can then explore them to discover what is causing
the decrease and how it might be corrected
Cont…
• Dashboards for operational purposes - When dashboards are used to monitor operations,
they must be designed differently from those that support strategic decision making or data
analysis.
• If the robotic arm on the manufacturing assembly line that attaches the car door to the chassis runs
out of bolts, you can't wait until the next day to become aware of the problem and take action.
• Likewise, if traffic on your web site suddenly drops to half its normal level, you want to be notified
immediately.
• The display media on operational dashboards must be very simple.
• In the stressful event of an emergency that requires an immediate response, the meaning of the
situation and the appropriate responses must be extremely clear and simple, or mistakes will be
made.
• In contrast to strategic dashboards, operational dashboards must have the means to grab your
attention immediately if an operation falls outside the acceptable threshold of performance.
• Also, the information that appears on operational dashboards is often more specific, providing a
deeper level of detail.
Typical Dashboard Data
• Dashboards are useful for all kinds of work.
• Whether you're a meteorologist monitoring the weather, an intelligence analyst monitoring potential
terrorist chatter, a CEO monitoring the health and opportunities of a multi‐billion dollar corporation, or
a financial analyst monitoring the stock market, a well‐designed dashboard could serve you well.
• Can categorize the Dashboard in two categories –
• Quantitative Data
• Non-quantitative Data

• Quantitative Data
• These measures are often expressed in summary form, most often as totals, slightly less often as averages (such as average
selling price), occasionally as measures of distribution (such as a standard deviation), and rarer still as measures of correlation
(such as a linear correlation coefficient).

• Summary expressions of quantitative data are particularly useful in dashboards, where it is necessary to monitor an array of
business phenomena at a glance. Obviously, the limited real estate of a single screen requires concise communication.
Cont..
• Variations in timing -Measures of what's currently going on can be expressed in a variety of timeframes. A few typical examples
include:
• This year to date
• This week to date
• This quarter to date
• Yesterday

• Enrichment through comparison- These measures can be displayed by themselves, but it is usually helpful to compare them to
one or more related measures to provide context and thereby enrich their meaning.
• These comparisons are often expressed graphically to clearly communicate the differences between the values, which might
not leap out as dramatically through the use of text alone.
• Multiple instances of a measure, each representing a categorical subdivision of the measure (for example, sales subdivided
into regions or a count of orders subdivided into numeric ranges in the form of a frequency distribution)
• Temporal instances of a measure (that is, a time series, such as monthly instances of the measure)
• Enrichment through evaluation - Because with a dashboard a great deal of data must be evaluated quickly, it also is quite
useful to explicitly declare whether something is good or bad.
• Such evaluative information is often encoded as special visual objects (for example, a traffic light) or as visual attributes (for
example, by displaying the measure in bright red to indicate a serious condition).
• When designed properly, simple visual indicators can clearly alert users to the state of particular measures without altering
the overall design of the dashboard.
• Evaluative indicators need not be limited to binary distinctions between good and bad, but if they exceed the limit of more
than a few distinct states (for example, very bad, bad, acceptable, good, and very good), they run the risk of becoming too
Cont..
• Non-Quantitative Data –
• Although most information that typically finds its way onto a dashboard is quantitative, some types of
non‐quantitative data, such as simple lists, are fairly common as well. Here are a few examples:
• Top 10 customers
• Issues that need to be investigated
• Tasks that need to be completed
• People who need to be contacted
• Another type of non‐quantitative data occasionally found on dashboards relates to schedules, including
tasks, due dates, the people responsible, and so on.
• This is common when the job that the dashboard supports involves the management of projects or
processes.
Dashboard Design issues
• Exceeding the boundaries of a single screen
• Supplying inadequate context for the data
• Displaying excessive detail or precision
• Choosing a deficient measure
• Choosing inappropriate display media
• Introducing meaningless variety
• Using poorly designed display media
• Encoding quantitative data inaccurately
• Arranging the data poorly
• Highlighting important data ineffectively or not at all
• Cluttering the display with useless decoration
• Misusing or overusing color
• Designing an unattractive visual displ
Exceeding the boundaries of a single screen
Exceeding the boundaries of a single screen
Supplying inadequate context for the data

Displaying excessive detail or precision

Choosing a deficient measure

Choosing inappropriate display media

Introducing meaningless variety
Using poorly designed display media
 Encoding Quantitative Data Inaccurately
Arranging the Data Poorly
Highlighting important data ineffectively or not at all
Visual Perception
• Following perception‐based rules, we can present our data in such a way that the important and
informative patterns stand out.
• If we disobey the rules, our data will be incomprehensible or misleading.

 Understanding the limits of short‐term memory

 Visually encoding data for rapid perception

 Gestalt principles of visual perception

Cont..
 Understanding the limits of short‐term memory - we will see how dashboards are connected to our visual
perception. Humans use eyes and memory to perceive.
• Our eyes do not register everything that is visible in the world around us, but only what lies within their span of
perception.
• Finally, only a little bit of what we attend to gets stored away for future use. Without these limits and filters,
perception would overwhelm our brains.
• Memory comes in three fundamental types:
• Iconic memory (a.k.a. the visual sensory register)
• Short‐term memory (a.k.a. working memory)
• Long‐term memory
• Short‐term memory is where information resides during conscious processing
• It is temporary.
• A portion of it is dedicated to visual information.
• It has a limited storage capacity.
• We can store only three to nine chunks of visual information at a time in short‐term memory.
• When its capacity is full, for something new to be brought into short‐term memory, something that's already
there must either be moved into long‐term memory or simply removed altogether (that is, forgotten).
Cont..
• What constitutes a "chunk" of visual information varies depending on the nature of the objects we are
seeing, aspects of their design, and our familiarity with them.

• For instance, individual numbers on a dashboard are stored as discrete chunks, but a well‐designed
graphical pattern, such as the pattern formed by one or more lines in a line graph, can represent a great
deal of information as a single chunk.

• This is one of the great advantages of graphs (when used appropriately and skillfully designed) over
text.

• Dashboards should be designed in a way that supports optimal chunking together of information so
that it can be perceived and understood most efficiently, in big visual gulps.
Cont..
Visually encoding data for rapid perception –
• Preattentive processing, the early stage of visual perception that rapidly occurs below the level of
consciousness, is tuned to detect a specific set of visual attributes.
• Attentive processing is sequential, and therefore much slower.

• Because the complex shapes of the numbers are not attributes that we perceive pre-attentively.

• Simple shapes such as circles and squares are pre-attentively perceived, but the shapes of numbers are
too elaborate.
Cont..
 Visually encoding data for rapid perception
• In Information Visualization: Perception for Design, Colin Ware suggests that the pre-attentive attributes of
visual perception can be organized into four categories: color, form, spatial position, and motion.

• The following table can simplifies the whole thing -

Cont..
Effect of color –
• One of the interesting (but hardly intuitive) things about color is that we don't perceive color in an absolute way.
What we see is dramatically influenced by the context that surrounds it.

Color must be used with a full awareness of context. We not only want data to be fully legible, but also to
appear the same when we wish it to appear the same and different when we wish it to appear different.
• Attributes of Form
• The most common application of orientation is in the form of italicized text, which is text that has
been reoriented from straight up and down to slightly slanted to the right.
• In dashboard design, the attribute of line length is most useful for encoding quantitative values as
bars in a bar graph. Line width, on the other hand, can be useful for highlighting purposes.
• The relative sizes of objects that appear on a dashboard can be used to visually rank their
importance.
• For instance, larger titles for sections of content, or larger tables, graphs, or icons, can be used to
declare the greater importance of the associated data.
• Attributes of Position
• The preattentive attribute 2‐D position is the primary means that we use to encode quantitative
data in graphs (for example, the position of data points in relation to a quantitative scale).

• This isn't arbitrary. Of all the preattentive attributes, differences in 2‐D position are the easiest and
most accurate to perceive.
• Attributes of Position

• The pre-attentive attribute 2‐D position is the primary means that we use to encode quantitative data in graphs
(for example, the position of data points in relation to a quantitative scale).

• Of all the pre-attentive attributes, differences in 2‐D position are the easiest and most accurate to perceive.

• Attributes of motion
• Flicker was chosen as the means to help us locate the cursor because it is a powerful attention‐getter.

• Evolution has equipped us with a heightened sensitivity to something that suddenly appears within our field of
vision.

• This is especially true for dashboards that are constantly updated with real‐time data and are used to monitor
operations that require immediate responses.
• Encoding Quantitative Versus Categorical Data
Cont..
• Limits to Perceptual Distinctness-

• When designing dashboards, bear in mind that there is a limit to the number of distinct expressions of a single
preattentive attribute that we can quickly and easily distinguish.
• For example, when using varying intensities of the color gray to distinguish data sets in a line graph, you must
make sure that the color of each line is different enough from those closest in color to it to clearly stand out as
distinct.
• When you place enough perceptual distance between the color intensities of the separate lines to make them
sufficiently distinct, there's a practical limit of about five to the number of distinct expressions that are available
across the gray scale.
Cont..
• Using Vivid and Subtle Colors Appropriately

• Color is so often misused in dashboard design

• Some colors are soothing, and some take hold of us
and shake us around.
• There are times when particular information needs
to grab the viewer's attention in an unavoidable
way, but using color for this purpose works only if
it's done sparingly.
• Reserve the use of bright, fully saturated color for
these special cases.
• Colors that are common in nature, such as soft
grays, browns, oranges, greens, and blues, work
very well as a standard color palette for dashboards.
• They allow the viewer to peruse the dashboard
calmly with an open mind, rather than stressfully,
with pinpoint attention in response to assaulting
colors.
Cont..
• Back in 1912, the Gestalt School of Psychology began its fruitful efforts to understand how we perceive
pattern, form, and organization in what we see.
• Their work resulted in a collection of Gestalt principles of perception that reveal those visual
characteristics that incline us to group objects together.
• These principles still stand today as accurate and useful descriptions of visual perception, and they offer
several useful insights that we can apply directly in our dashboard designs to intentionally tie data
together, separate data, or make some data stand out as distinct from the rest.

• Proximity
• Closure
• Similarity
• Continuity
• Enclosure
• Connection
 The Principle of Proximity
It says objects that are located near one
another as belonging to the same group.
In the first fig, based on their relative
locations, we automatically see the dots as
belonging to three separate groups. This is
the simplest way to link data that you want to
be seen together.

The principle of proximity can also be used to

direct viewers to scan data on a dashboard
predominantly in a particular direction:
either left to right or top to bottom. Placing
sections of data closer together horizontally
encourages viewers' eyes to group the
sections horizontally, and thus to scan from
left to right. Placing sections of data closer
together vertically achieves the opposite
effect.
• The Principle of Similarity

We tend to group together objects

that are similar in color, size, shape,
and orientation. The Figure
illustrates this tendency.
• The Principle of Enclosure
• It says human perceives objects as
belonging together when they are enclosed
by anything that forms a visual border
around them (for example, a line or a
common field of color).
• This enclosure causes the objects to appear
to be set apart in a region that is distinct
from the rest of what we see.
• The arrangement of the two sets of circles
in this figure is exactly the same, yet the
differing enclosures direct us to group the
circles in very different ways.
• This principle is exhibited frequently in the
use of borders and fill colors or shading in
tables and graphs to group information and
set it apart.
• The Principle of Closure
• Humans have a keen dislike for loose ends.
When faced with ambiguous visual stimuli
objects that could be perceived either as
open, incomplete, and unusual forms or as
closed, whole, and regular forms we
naturally perceive them as the latter.

• The principle of closure asserts that we

perceive open structures as closed,
complete, and regular whenever there is a
way that we can reasonably do so.
It is natural for us to perceive what appears on the left in
Figure as a rectangle rather than two sets of three connected
lines connected at right angles and to perceive the object on
the right as a complete oval rather than simply a curved line.
• We can apply this tendency to perceive whole
structures in dashboards, especially in the design
of graphs.
• For example, we can group objects (points, lines,
or bars in a graph, etc.) into visual regions
without the use of complete borders or
background colors to define the space.
• This is preferable, because the need to display a
large collection of data in a small amount of space
requires that we eliminate all visual content that
is not absolutely necessary, to avoid clutter.
• As shown in Figure, it is sufficient to define the
area of a graph through the use of a single set of X
and Y axes, rather than by lines that form a
complete rectangle around the graph, with or
without a fill color.
• The Principle of Continuity
• We perceive objects as belonging together, as part of
a single whole, if they are aligned with one another or
appear to form a continuation of one another.
• Things that are aligned with one another appear to
belong to the same group. In the table, it is obvious
which items are division names and which are
department names, based on their distinct alignment.
• Divisions, departments, and headcounts are clearly
grouped, without any need for vertical grid lines to
delineate them.
• Even though the division and department columns
overlap with no white space in between, their distinct
alignment alone makes them easy to distinguish.
• This same technique can be used to tie together
separate sections of data on a dashboard.
• The Principle of Connection
• We perceive objects that are connected in some way, such as by a line, as part of the same group.
• As the below figure illustrates, the perception of grouping produced by connection is stronger than that
produced by proximity or similarity (color, size, and shape);
• it is weaker only than that produced by enclosure.
• The principle of connection is especially useful for tying together non‐quantitative data for example, to
represent relationships between steps in a process or between employees in an organization.
Cont..
• Applying the Principles of Visual Perception to Dashboard
Design
• Two of the greatest challenges in dashboard design are to make the most important data stand out
from the rest, and to arrange what is often a great deal of disparate information in a way that
makes sense, gives it meaning, and supports its efficient perception.
• An understanding of the preattentive attributes of visual perception and the Gestalt principles
provides a useful conceptual foundation for facing these challenges.
• It is much more helpful to understand how and why something works than to simply understand
that something works.
•

• If you understand the how and why, when you're faced with new challenges you'll be able to
determine whether or not the principles apply and how to adapt them to the new circumstances.

• If you've simply been told that something works in a specific situation, you'll be stuck when faced
with conditions that are even slightly different.
• Characteristics of a Well­Designed Dashboard –
• The fundamental challenge of dashboard design involves squeezing a great deal of useful and often
disparate information into a small amount of space, all the while preserving clarity.
• There are some other challenges too such as selecting the right data in the first place
• Limited to a single screen to keep all the data within eye span, dashboard real estate is extremely
valuable: you can't afford to waste an inch.
• For example, cockpit of a commercial jet. Years of effort went into its design to ensure that despite the
many things pilots must monitor, they can see everything that's going on at a glance.
• When designing dashboards, you must include only the information that you absolutely need, you must
condense it in ways that don't decrease its meaning, and
• you must display it using visual display mechanisms that, even when quite small, can be easily read and
understood.
• Well‐designed dashboards deliver information that is:

• Exceptionally well organized

• Condensed, primarily in the form of summaries and exceptions
• Specific to and customized for the dashboard's audience and objectives
• Displayed using concise and often small media that communicate the data and its message in the
clearest and most direct way possible
Key Goals in the Visual Design Process
• Edward R. Tufte introduced a concept in his 1983 classic The Visual Display of Quantitative Information
that he calls the "data‐ink ratio."
• When quantitative data is displayed in printed form, some of the ink that appears on the page presents
data, and some presents visual content that is not data (a.k.a. non‐data).

Above figure shows a table and a graph where the non‐data ink encoded as red.
• Formally,
• A large share of ink on a graphic should present data‐information, the ink changing as the data
change. Data‐ink is the non‐erasable core of a graphic, the non‐ redundant ink arranged in
response to variation in the numbers represented. Then,
• Data‐ink ratio = data‐ink / total ink used to print the graphic
= proportion of a graphic's ink devoted to the non‐redundant display of data‐
information
= 1.0 ‐ proportion of a graphic that can be erased without loss of data‐information.

Edward R. Tufte then applies it as a principle of design: "Maximize the data‐ink ratio, within reason. Every bit of ink on a graphic
requires a reason. And nearly always that reason should be that the ink presents new information.

This principle applies perfectly to the design of dashboards, with one simple revision: because dashboards are always displayed
on computer screens-

“Across the entire dashboard, non‐data pixels any pixels that are not used to display data, excluding a blank background
should be reduced to a reasonable minimum. ”
• Much of visual dashboard design revolves around two fundamental goals:
1. Reduce the non‐data pixels.
2. Enhance the data pixels.
 Eliminate all unnecessary non ­data pixel
• The next few figures provide examples of non‐data pixels that often find their way onto dashboards but
can usually be eliminated without loss.

Graphics that serve merely as decoration.

should eliminate graphics that provide
nothing but decoration.

Variations in color that don't encode any meaning.

These bars vary in color for no
meaningful reason.
Borders that are used to delineate sections of data
when the simple use of white/blank space alone
would work as well. Unnecessary borders around
sections of data fragment the display.

Fill colors that are used to delineate sections of content such as a

title, the data region or legend of a graph, the background of a table,
or an entire section of data, when a neutral background would work
as well. Fill colors to separate sections of the display are
unnecessary.
Gradients of fill color when a solid color would work as well.
Gradients of color both on the bars of this graph and across the
entire background add distracting non‐data pixels.

Grid lines in graphs. Grid lines in graphs are rarely useful. They
are one of the most prevalent forms of distracting non‐data
pixels found in dashboards.
Grid lines in tables, which divide the data into individual cells or divide either the rows or the columns, when white
space alone would do the job as well. Grid lines in tables can make otherwise simple displays difficult to look
at

Fill colors in the alternating rows of a table to delineate them when white space alone would work as well. Fill colors
should be used to delineate rows in a table only when this is necessary to help viewers' eyes track across the
rows.
Complete borders around the data region of a graph when one
horizontal and one vertical axis would sufficiently define the space.
A complete border around the data region of a graph should be
avoided when a single set of axes would adequately define the
space.

3D in graphs when the third dimension doesn't correspond to actual

data. 3D should always be avoided when the added dimension of
depth doesn't represent actual data.
 De­emphasize and regularize the non­data pixels that remain
• Not all non‐data pixels can be eliminated without losing something useful.

• Some support the structure, organization, or legibility of the dashboard.

• For instance, when data is tightly packed, sometimes it is necessary to use lines or fill colors to delineate one
section from another, rather than white space alone.

• In these cases, rather than eliminating these useful non‐data pixels, you should simply mute them visually so
they don't attract attention.

• Focus should always be placed on the information itself, not on the design of the dashboard, which should be
almost invisible.

• The trick is to de‐emphasize these non‐data pixels by making them just visible enough to do their job, but no
more.
Few examples of non‐data pixels that are either always or occasionally useful. Examples are shown in two
ways: 1) a version that is too visually prominent, which illustrates what you should avoid; and 2) a version
that is just visible enough to do the job, which is the objective.

Axis lines used to define the data region of a

graph are almost always useful, but they can
be muted, like those on the right.

Lines can be used effectively to

delineate adjacent sections of the
display from one another, but the
weight of these lines can be kept
to a minimum.
Grid lines are useful when they help
viewers compare specific subsections of
graphs, such as the range of values that
fall within 65 to 75 on the vertical scale
and 35,000 to 45,000 on the horizontal
scale.
Grid lines and fill colors can be used in tables to clearly
distinguish some columns from others, but this should
be done in the muted manner seen below rather than
the heavy‐handed manner seen above.

Fill colors can be used to delineate rows in a table when

necessary to help viewers' eyes scan across the rows,
but this should always be done in the muted manner
seen below rather than the visually weighty manner
seen above.
 “These examples demonstrate how the visual prominence of non‐data pixels can usually be de‐
emphasized by using light, lowly saturated colors, such as light grays, and minimal stroke weights
(that is, thin lines).Non‐data pixels also can be pushed further from notice by regularizing them
(that is, by making them consistent). ”
• Another category of content often found on
dashboards that can be considered non‐data pixels is
that which supports navigation and data selection.

• Buttons and selection boxes are often used to allow

users to navigate to another screen or to choose the
data that appears on the dashboard.

• If they must exist, place them in an out‐of‐the‐way

location such as the bottom‐right corner of the
screen and mute them visually, so they won't
compete with the data for attention.

This dashboard gives navigational and data selection controls far more
dominance and space than they deserve.
 Eliminate all unnecessary data pixels

• Elimination of unnecessary data pixels is achieved not only through the complete removal of less relevant data
• But also by condensing data through the use of summaries and exceptions, so that the level of detail that is
displayed doesn't exceed what's necessary.
• For most applications, it would be absurd to include detailed information such as transaction‐level sales
data on a dashboard some level of summarization is needed, and it is often up to you to determine what
that level is.
• You might choose to display a single quarter‐to‐date value, a value per region, or a value per month, just to
name a few possibilities.
• Consider the below example where, three time‐series graphs displaying public transportation rider statistics
contain three levels of detail: daily for the current month, monthly for the current year, and yearly for the last
10 years.
• Above example displaying a summarizing technique.
• This technique involves multi‐foci displays.
• When it is useful to display historical context for a measure, such as the last 12 months or the last 5
years, often information that is more distant from the present is less important than recent history.
• In such cases, there is no reason to display the full range of data at the same level of detail.
• For instance, you might want to display the current month as daily measures, the preceding 12 months
as monthly measures, and the preceding 4 years as annual measures.
 Highlight the most important data pixels that remain

• All the information that finds its way onto a dashboard should be important, but not all data is created equal:
some data is more important than other data. The most important information can be divided into two
categories:
• Information that is always important
• Information that is only important at the moment

• Considering the entire collection of information that belongs on a dashboard, you should be able to prioritize it
according to what is usually of greatest interest to viewers.
• For instance, a dashboard that serves the needs of a corporation's executives might display several categories of
financial, sales, and personnel data.
• On the whole, however, the executives usually care about some key measures more than others.
• The other category of especially important information is that which is important only when it reveals
something out of the ordinary.
• A measure that has fallen far behind its target, an opportunity that has just arisen and won't last for long, or an
operational condition that demands immediate attention all fall into this category.
• These two categories of important information require different means of highlighting on a dashboard.
• The first category information that is always important can be emphasized using static means, but the
second category information that is important only at the moment requires a dynamic means of
emphasis.

This Figure identifies the emphasizing effect

that different regions of a dashboard provide.
The top‐left and center sections of the
dashboard are the areas of greatest emphasis.
The greater emphasis tied to the upper left is
primarily due to the conventions of most
western languages, which sequence words on
a page from left to right and top to bottom.
Contrary to the influence of reading
conventions, however, the very center of the
screen is also a region of strong emphasis,
due to a more fundamental inclination of
visual perception.
 Make the Viewing Experience
Aesthetically Pleasing
• Choose Colors Appropriately: Poor use of color is perhaps the most common offense to a dashboard's
appearance. Colors that are bright or dark naturally demand more attention. Too many bright or dark
colors can quickly become visually exhausting. When selecting colors, keep the following guidelines in
mind:
• Keep bright colors to a minimum, using them only to highlight data that requires attention.

• Except for content that demands attention, use less saturated colors such as those that are predominant in
nature (for example, the colors of the earth and sky).
• Use a barely discernable pale background color other than pure white to provide a more soothing, less starkly
contrasting surface on which the data can reside.
• Choose High Resolution for Clarity:
• The high density of information that typically appears on a dashboard requires that the graphical images be
displayed with exceptional visual clarity.
• Images with poor resolution are hard to read, which slows down the process of scanning the dashboard for
information (and is just plain annoying).
• Visual clarity does not require fancy shading or photo‐realism; simple high‐resolution images will do.
• Choose the Right Text: Final recommendation regarding dashboard aesthetics involves the use of text.
• Use the most legible font you can find.
• No need to set a mood or reinforce a theme by using an unusual font.
• Ornate text might be appropriate for a poster advertising the circus, but not for a dashboard.
• You want a font that can be read the fastest with the least amount of strain on the eyes.
• Find one that works and stick with it throughout the dashboard.
• You can use a different font for headings to help them stand out if you wish, but that's the practical
limit.
• Below figure illustrates a few of the good and bad choices that are available.