Data Translation

I began this project by doing research on Data visualisation and Information design/graphics. Looking at examples such as the 'Information is Beautiful' project by David McCandless and the work of Stefanie Posavec gave me a greater insight into the possible outcomes I could produce both visually and conceptually. 

I struggled to find a topic to translate data from as I didn't want to research into anything shallow nor did I want to choose something that I didn't genuinely care about. Initially I chose to collect quantitative data on my day in terms of what I was doing at a each precise moment in time. Although I found this interesting, this would have been a very limiting topic as looking at myself alone is quite a basic treatment. After this I then went on to to looking at how things can be 'recorded'. By considering factors such as CCTV, my oyster card, debit card payments, social media, and other factors. These thoughts then led me to consider privacy which can be a controversial topic as in this day and age with technological advancements, individuals arguably have little or no privacy. 

Gathering information from a survey I conducted on 15-20 year olds gave me an insight on the opinions of privacy and whether or not we lack privacy in society. From the results, I came to the conclusion that not only do we lack privacy, people seem to think they cherish their privacy whereas their actions contradict this claim. This insight sparked the idea to approach and translate the issue of privacy in a new, fresh way. Rather than making my data translation abstract, I wanted to make it easily understandable by using symbols to visually communicate the results from the survey and what they suggest.

As the brief is to communicate data visually in a new and fresh way, I asked people from my group whether or not they understood what I was attempting to do with my project and  got positive feedback. After throwing ideas back and forth with my peer I decided rather than just creating a poster a better way to present my information would be to do it in the form of a concertina/book which makes the information a lot more interactive.

Overall, the outcome for this project was successful as I achieved all I set out to do however, my main issue was time management as it took me quite some time to figure out what data I wanted to translate. Conceptually, I think I met the brief's requirement of saying something interesting about my topic. In addition to this, visually I don't think my treatment of this was obvious in relation to the visual references I found during my research. If I was able to change anything about this project I would experiment more with the possibilities of my book in terms of how it can be presented as it could be more exciting.