Wednesday, October 20, 2010

The art of layering and separation.

After reading the chapter about layering and separation several times, the only way I can explain it is by showing a bad map and clarifying what the designer could've done to achieve a better design...of course these are all Tufte's opinions.



This is not a good map because...
All information should not be at the same visual level...it is.
The text is not harmonized or placed properly.
There is no hierarchy of visual effects.
Background and foreground compete...shouldn't.

Proper relationship was not used among information layers, i.e., all the streets have the same thickness and intensity. Shapes shouldn't be equal...they are. It de-emphasizes layer differences, because of the use of several dark colors, the blue, red and black. Positioning text was difficult because of color clashes. A better approach might've been to use intensity of a single hue, leaving visual space for additional information.

In conclusion, I think this is not a good map because...It is not layered and separated properly.

1 comment:

  1. I agree, this map makes me dizzy. The shapes are appear to be even and the colors appear to be the same shade and tone
    so there is too much distribution, and no focal point.

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