Bella consults

Our eyes read lines like this: flat line = little change. Inclined line = more change. Steeply inclined line = a lot more change.

It’s all wrong here. You believe right increases more than left. Wrong.

Scales are at random. And don’t go together. Like in many newspapers, everyday. For example in the FTD.

Here it is ok:

Why? Because both scales show the same relative change:

(12–8)/8 = 0,5. And (120–80)/80 = 0,5.

Because scales are at random. And don’t go together. Like in many newspapers, everyday. For example in the FTD. And the SZ. And. And. And.

Source: Süddeutsche Zeitung (SZ), No. 137, 2010–06–18, page 22.

I was tough on red. It’s a signal for bad. What do we use for good? Green? Possible. Blue? Possible, too. I am generous with colors for good. Thus, this chart is okay. (Not the numbers: aggregated without weights.)

Source: FAZ, No. 288, 2009–11–12, page 11. Revenue margins in the metal and electronic industry after taxes in percent (31 H-DAX companies).

I am careful with green. Just because something is above zero it’s not always good. That’s what you think with green. Mostly.

Source: DeltaMaster

Say it like that: A company is in the black. Or in the red. E.ON colors all numbers in red. Also columns, bars, lines.

Investments. Prices. Dividends. Increase in capacity. Decrease in capacity. Norway. Germany. Internal numbers. External numbers. Positive changes. Negative changes.

Source(both): E.ON AG (Ed.), Performance and streamlining, April 2010; PDF.

Why? Because of Corporate Identity. And the companies CI says red. I’m very strict because red is a special color. A signal for bad. Everybody understands. At once. Signals for good are more difficult. What is good, what is normal?

The ones from marketing should do promotions. But no controlling.

To make eye-catchers: ok. To make diagrams from data: always. To make eye-catchers from data: know-how needed. Taste helps. And respect.

The five most frequent causes of death within a year, in countries with lower and higher incomes. Source: Die Zeit, no. 45, 2009–09–29, page 34. Click to enlarge.

The text for the graphic wants us to care about the sick. Also in poor countries. Illness becomes clipart. Ill persons become swollen and shrunken figurines. Red and glittering. Crosses as shadows.

I like simple. But not more simple. Some road signs in Germany are renewed. And more modern. And more illogical. Because details are missing. It´s like with fonts. It´s good for reading when letters differ in many details.

The deer is ok. It just has a little more weight. I like more weight. It still jumps as nice as before. And as high as before. Zack! Into the front window. Watch out!

Crossing is difficult in traffic. The train at the old railroad crossing is old fashioned. As old fashioned as the disc symbol for saving data. The train became more modern. But it’s headed directly towards you. At an angle from the front. Will high speed trains now regularly jump out of rail tracks? Mainly at railroad crossings? Help!

Crossing bikers are difficult, too. In the past. Today bicycles are dangerous. Because they come without lights. Without pedals. Alone. The biker already fell of.

In the past we were warned of traffic jams. Many cars brake. Suddenly it becomes tight. Today we are warned of convoys. All close one after another. Nobody brakes.

That´s not too bad. We will learn the new symbols. But they are not a good example for clever design. By the way: he found good design for road signs in New Zealand.

The Financial Times folded flags. To little houses. Cut apart. And distorted. Totally. 11 is hardly as large as 22. With the flags it’s mean. The scaling is even meaner. The chart is bad und nothing fits. Even good newspapers have to be read critically. Don’t trust blindly. Not one source. Regardless, how famous it is. Not even me.

Source: Financial Times, 2009–11–12, page 17.

He already railed against pies. So did I. With a lot of good reasons. Labels difficult. Area comparisons difficult. And so on. Actually, a pity. Because pie-charts state clearly: That’s all you can share. A Pie-chart claims: I am hundred percent. But you seldom know these.

Great, if a pie-chart does the job after all. Like here. Because it’s a pizza.

Source: Süddeutsche Zeitung, No. 21, 2010–01–27, Page 16. Different ways to share a pizza – green is a fair share, red is unfair. Click to enlarge.

The pizza looks like a chart. But it’s not. The pizza has no topping. Salami, mushrooms, tomatoes, cheese: unimportant. Pizza as close to reality as possible. But no closer. And if you divide a pizza (if I was to slow), you really have to estimate areas.

Who has got pizza, paints pizza. Who has got numbers, shouldn’t paint.

In October I said: I write a book. There was still a lot to be done. Layout. Litho. Inspect text. Check sources. Specify material and outfit. Find a printer who prints my beautiful fur beautifully. Press proof. Press proof again. Print. Bind. And a lot more work. Now my book is completed. It’s lovely.
Here you can have a taste of it (in German). And order it.

We printed the book four weeks ago. Here I watch out. That everything works fine.

Perspective is: You want to show space. On paper. That is 2D. But it should look like space. Many use 3D. Perspective also is: How large something appears when it is a certain distance away. And vice versa. Works great.

Source: Wall Street Journal Europe, 2009–12–28, p. 14.

Look at the skyscrapers. Work great, too. Manhattan? Funny: The Skyscrapers are not in the same street. Where are they? That’s confusing. Is the fourth half the size of the second one? Could be. 17 and 34. Somehow looks different. Because of the perspective. We should compare the lengths of the edges. One edge is enough for that. Here we have eight too much.

Besides, it looks like a timeline. But isn’t one.

Picture and figure may be good. Here the chair is on focus.

Picture and figure may be bad. The nice guy could also work for Ford, or Mercedes, or, or, or.

Picture without a figure may be good. Aha. That’s a typical hacker’s place. Didn’t know that. Never been there.

Picture without a figure may be embarrassing. Below the picture it reads: Budweiser wants to sell more. A Barman pours a beer. In Brussels. So what?

Source: WSJ Europe, 2009–11–13, p.W9, p.2, p.14, p.8.

He wrote about the Wall Street Journal. The European issue. And the facelift from 2009–11–17. Ha. He should have taken a look at the issue from 2009–11–13:

Source: Wall Street Journal Europe, 2009–11–13, p. 26.

You have to add up the overlaps to get the point. The colors are no better. You have to learn: Samsung is always on top. But has changing colors. The same as the competitor. But that is patterned. The competitors’ bars are pale at the end. Anyway, you have to add that. Ok, than I just read the numbers. Now my eyes go left-right, left-right, left-right, left-right.
The designer deserves the same. Once left, once right. Vigorously.

Once more didactic. Again the graphic from the newspaper Handelsblatt:

Source: Handelsblatt, 2009–04–30, No. 83, p. 1, original copy this time.
Trucks (Straßengüterverkehr), trains (Eisenbahnen), ships (Binnenschifffahrt).

You think: Truck is faster growing than train. Train is only growing little. Ships hardly at all. But that’s not true. You can’t compare developments for values on different levels. Logarithmical helps.

Now you see: Rail is growing faster than truck. 70 percent to 56 percent. Ship even dropped in between. All in all it grew 3 percent.

Logarithmic doesn’t always work. But more often.

Today it’s getting didactic. I did some cutting.

Source: Handelsblatt, April 30th 2009, no. 83, p. 1, redesign by me. Click for original. Graphic displays increase of highway transportation in billions of ton-kilometers (1997 to 2008).

Many will say: left is correctly scaled. They believe: Null value must be shown. Regardless of line or column – never cut.

But: The null value is not sea level. On the right the full space is utilized to display changes. That’s important, often. All other scales more or less steepen the slope. They show more or less details. That the variation is bigger than 50 %: neither visible on the right nor the left. Better write that down.

Anyway: To cut lines’ feet is not forbidden. Snip snap.

PowerPoint is in discussion. It works well as a slide projector. Then they can all see what they are supposed to see. Not good if they see what they are supposed to hear: Slides look like notes for somebody’s speech. Like this:

If slides look like this: trash them.

Many just read off their notes. More slowly than people could read themselves. Because reading is faster than hearing. You pray for the next slide. Which ideally is the last one.

Notes are for the pocket. Only in case of need you pull them out. Never show them to anybody. And for sure: Don´t show them to everybody. Slides which look like notes: trash them.

Instead: make eyes like that.

6 reasons for vacation. 2 years. 2 parts of Germany. 24 values. Sounds easy. It’s not. A lot to think about in this chart.

Source: Welt am Sonntag (WAMS), No. 43, 2009–10–25, p.24
Motivations of Germans for vacation, East (”Ost”) vs. West Germany, from top: new impressions, experience, being on travel, to indulge in something, relaxation, reactivation of memories.

Closeness connects: The headline connects with all first bars. It becomes graphical itself. But shouldn’t. It’s for all four bars.

Time is horizontal: We had that before. Here, a decrease is a movement to the left. Hard to understand for the eye.

Man with a hat: Two men stand beside each other. The smaller one wears a hat. How small is that one? Values to the right of the bar: better not this time.

Colours group: In WAMS all values for 1991 and all values for 2008. Might be ok. Not ideal here.

Checkered is out: Stripes in the background are funny. And decrease readability.

Most important: reason, years, change between years, part of Germany and variance between East and West – all packed into the vertical. Too much.

Source: DeltaMaster

My rule: Use two visual axes: vertical and horizontal, if it helps. Doesn’t always work. Here it’s ok.