Our Tools

"We become what we behold. We shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us." - Marshall McLuhan

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Final Project

For my final project, I already knew that I wanted to work with Data Visualizations but I was having a really hard time coming up with what topic to explore. When Eric showed us the brainstorm map that helped me a lot. I started with the general idea of Time and eventually came to how people look at the passage of time in their lives. I think for everyone it is different because we all have led very different lives and view things differently. After I had my idea, I looked through pages and pages of data visualizations to kind of get some inspiration and ideas.





For me, the number of houses I've lived in stands out because I have moved so many times but it never seemed weird to me until I met someone who had lived in the same house his ENTIRE life. Concerts are another important life marker in my life.The color and size of the cubes represent how long I lived at a certain place. The larger the block/darker the color, the longer I lived there.




 



I sometimes figure out when something happened in my life around when it happened in reference to a concert. When did I dye my hair red? Oh well it was definitely after the Coheed and Cambria concert but before the Them Crooked Vultures concert.I used pictures I took myself as much as possible and if I didn't have a picture from the concert I used a picture of the venue.In doing this project I realized I want to take more pictures. I have the memories of the events which are very important to me but I wish I had the physical pictures to show and share with my children someday.






This last one was kind of just for fun. I saw a data visualization on a specific species of fish (click here) and I thought it would be interesting to see what a similar visualization would look like for me.


Here are the resources I used:

Friedman, Vitaly. “Data Visualization: Modern Approaches.” 2 August 2007. 19 April 2012.
          http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/08/02/data-visualization- modern-approaches/

“How to Draw Circle in with No Fill in Photoshop.” YouTube. 23 April 2012.
          http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EK07W73lm7Y

“Totoaba.” Visual.ly. 19 April 2012. http://visual.ly/tototaba

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