DV

Graphical excellence

Get used to not just seeing or looking at visualizations but to reading them.

Excellence in statistical graphics consists of complex ideas communicated with clarity, precision, and efficiency. Graphical displays should

• show the data
• induce the viewer to think about the substance rather than about methodology, graphic design, the technology of graphic production, or something else
• avoid distorting what the data have to say
• present numbers in a small space
• make large data sets coherent (logical and consistent)
• encourage the eye to compare different pieces of data
• reveal the data at several levels of detail, from a broad overview to the fine structure
• serve a reasonably clear purpose: description, exploration, tabulation, or decoration
• be closely integrated with the statistical and verbal descriptions of a data set.

Graphical excellence can almost never be obtained without multivariate data – data maps, time-series, space-time narrative designs, and relational graphics.

Graphical excellence is efficient communication of complex ideas.

Why waste the power of data graphics on simple linear changes,

which can usually be better summarized in one or two numbers?

Instead, graphics should be reserved for richer, more complex, more difficult statistical material.

Graphical excellence is the well-designed presentation of interesting data – a matter of substance (domain/discipline), of statistics, and of design.

Graphical excellence consists of complex ideas communicated with clarity, precision, and efficiency.

“Graphical excellence is what gives the viewer the greatest number of ideas in the shortest time with the least ink in the smallest space.”

Graphical excellence is nearly always multivariate.

And graphical excellence requires telling the truth about the data.

"Get it right or let it alone. The conclusion you jump to maybe your own." - James Thurber.