Parsons School of Design | School of Art, Media and Technology

Intro to Data Visualization

PSAM 5010 Syllabus, Fall 2024

CRN 5884

MON 7:00 – 9:40PM | 6 East 16th Street. Room: 1208

INSTRUCTOR: Jonathan Thirkield, jthirkield@newschool.edu

Course Description: This is a seminal course on information design and aesthetics. Students will study graphical theory, graph grammar, and investigate hierarchies, patterns, and relationships in data structures. Students will examine the role of scale, proportion, color, form, structure, motion, and composition in data visualization. Using computational methods, students will create drawings, graphs, indexes, and maps that explore the database as cultural form. The function of this course is to build a community among the students and orient them to the whole program.

Learning Outcomes:

By the successful completion of this course, students will be able to:

1. Understand the various methods and techniques of modern data visualization along with its historical origins.
2. Design and critique visual communication and information displays.
3. Describe, analyze, and evaluate various data visualization approaches.
4. Implement data visualizations using web technologies including D3, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript
5. Explore creative possibilities for visualization and knowledge generation

COURSE OUTLINE

Week 1: Intro to Visual Forms (8/26)

Setting Up Coding Environment

Lecture/Discussion: Visual Forms

Assignment:

Code Intro 1: Text Machine: Functions and Text Processes in JavaScript

Reading:

Whitney Battle-Baptiste and Britt Rusert, W. E. B. du Bois's Data Portraits: Visualizing Black America

Canvas Discussion:

Discussion 1: W. E. B. du Bois's Data Portraits

Week 2: Coding Intro: JavaScript Basics (9/2)

Tutorial: Data Types and Coding Structures in JavaScript

Assignment:

Code Intro 1: JavaScript Basics

Canvas Discussion:

Discussion 2: Visualizations of Time

Week 3: Time Visualizations (9/11)

Javascript Review, Intro to Coding Graphics

Lecture/Discussion: Data and Time

Assignment:

Visualization Exercise 1: Time Visualization (Due 9/23)

Reading:

Johanna Ducker, Interpreting Visualization :: Visualizing Interpretation

Canvas Discussion:

Discussion 3: Exercise 1 Concept Drawings

Week 4: Time Visualizations Workshop (9/16)

Share & Critique: Design Development

Assignment:

Visualization Exercise 1 continued: Time Visualization (Due 9/23)

Week 5: Quantititave Visualization (9/23)

Presentation & Critique: Exercise 1

Tutorial: D3 Quantities & Scales

Assignment:

Visualization Exercise 2: Quantities, categories, and summarized data (Due 10/7)

Reading:

William Bevington, Complications and Adjacencies: An Organizing Logic for Information Graphics

Canvas Discussion:

Discussion 4: Quantitative Visualization

Week 6: Quantititave Visualization Workshop (9/30)

Share & Critique: Design Development

Tutorial: D3 Quantitative Data Grouping and Data Transformation

Assignment:

Visualization Exercise 2 continued: Quantities, categories, and summarized data (Due 10/7)

Week 7: Qualitative Data & Building Data (10/7)

Presentation & Critique: Exercise 2

Lecture/Discussion: Data Taxonomy and Ontology

Assignment:

Visualization Exercise 3.0: Creating a Qualitative Data Set (Due 10/14)

Reading:

Lisa Gitelman and Virginia Jackson, "Raw Data" is an Oxymoron: Introduction

Canvas Discussion:

Discussion 5: Building Databases

Week 8: Qualitative Data & Data Structures (10/14)

Share & Critique: Database Development

Tutorial: D3 Hierarchies - parent/child data structures

Assignment:

Visualization Exercise 3.1: Qualitative Visualization (Due 10/28)

Reading:

Ellen Gruber Garvey, "facts and FACTS": Abolitionists' Database Innovations

Week 9: Qualitative Visual Forms (10/21)

Qualitative Visualization Workshop

Tutorial: D3 Qualitative Forms: Trees and Sunbursts

Assignment:

Visualization Exercise 3.1 continued: Qualitative Visualization (Due 10/28)

Week 10: Geocoding and Maps (10/28)

Presentation & Critique: Exercise 3

Tutorial: D3 Maps: Shapefiles, TopoJSON, GeoJSON, and Point Maps

Assignment:

Visualization Exercise 4: Geospatial Data (Due 11/11)

Reading:

Giorgia Lupi, Non-linear Storytelling: Journalism through "Info-spatial" Compositions

Canvas Discussion:

Discussion 6: Non-Linear Storytelling Examples

Week 11: Geocoding and Maps (11/4)

Tutorial: D3 Maps: Shape Maps, Joining data with GeoJSON data

Assignment:

Visualization Exercise 4 continued: Geospatial Data (Due 11/11)

Week 12: Final Projects Introduced (11/11)

Presentation & Critique: Exercise 4

Lecture/Discussion: Visual Storytelling

Assignment:

Final Project Presentations: Research, Data Gathering, Initial Sketches

Reading:

Ellen Lupton, Type on Screen

Week 13: Final Projects (11/18)

Final Projects Student Presentations of Final Projects Data Sets and Concepts

Assignment:

Final Projects: Design Development

Reading:

Johanna Drucker, Interface and Interpretation

Week 14: Final Projects (12/2)

Share & Critique: Final Project Designs

Lecture/Discussion: Interface Design and User Experience

Tutorial: Final Design checklist

Assignment:

Final Projects: Final Visualization

Week 15: Final Projects (12/9)

Final Projects Final Visualizations - Presentation & Critiques