I haven’t seen too many journalistic visualizations in my day, but through watching this short film I could quickly see the benefits of these visualizations to show data. They were able to show complicated data in such a way that was easily understand by the viewer. At first glance many of the visualizations looked much like abstract art, but after seeing how they were used you quickly were able to visually see connections between ideas and concepts, or people and places. These visualizations even though are data driven, and are representing data each one of them needs to take into strong account of basic design concepts.
As the film mentioned, humans are programmed to be visual creatures, so visual representations of data naturally work well with our minds, and aid us in understand concepts and connections. The visualizations show a massive amount of data that is also complex, yet through visuals the average person can draw understanding and pull data from them.
I found the topic interesting when they discussed how visualizations are a way to tell a story. After hearing this I viewed the visualization in an even different light, and was able to see how data could tell and story of a population, or country, or of the data it was representing — if done correctly. These visualization accompany a journalism story, and aid in the understand of the topic and also help tell the story to the viewer or readers.
In my mind I was able to link this film back to our current infographic project. It made me remind myself to keep in mind basic graphic design concepts are key, and need to always be in the forefront of my mind when designing. But to also tell a story with my designs, design can tell narratives and convey meaning, and this is what I must strive to do.