So today, I’m checking out an app for the iPhone called Photo Stats. It’s objective is to tell me all about the photos I take. I think the most useful thing I learned in this trial is how to do a screen capture of my iPhone (hold the menu button and click on the on/off switch) – who knew?
What did PhotoStats tell me?
I took 59 photos in North America (shocker), mainly in SF, but a few in Truckee and West Hollywood, most of my pics are taken in the afternoon, in portrait mode, what my shutter speed was, my most productive date was April 4th, etc.
The data wasn’t very interesting for me, but I don’t think I’m the target audience (with a toddler at home, I don’t do much travelling these days, and most pics are of my little munchkin). But if I harken back to pre-toddler days when I traveled a lot and took pics of more diverse (yet less cute) subjects, I suspect it would have been cool to see an infographic of my pics.
What I liked?
- Easy
- Nice graphics
What I didn’t like
- Cost $0.99 (I didn’t budget $ for this obsession, but I guess it’s not so bad)
- iPhone only (good thing I have one)
- Kind of useless info (I’m not taking fancy pics from my iPhone)
- Only looks at current pics on iPhone
Bottom Line
Is there a business use for this? I don’t really see it. What I think is more useful is if the app hit the photo library on my hard drive and then told me this information – most of my pics are from my DSLR and these include pics from all over the world and different shutter speed. Maybe I’ll look around for an tool that would do that.
Exactly!. Ever since I encountered that muaiscl visualization of research data I started to think about how senses interact with the basic concept of manipulating data into a form that our human senses can understand and synthesize better than that numbers. In theory, this can be done for any of the senses, it is just that we usually use vision. Thinking you could have data displayed in smooth or rough textures of different levels/heights or intensity, or sour/sharp/sweet odors. You could even use levels and types of pain, although I would hope not. The point is that visualization is a tool for helping us understand and communicate data in ways that are not intuitive for most people. To convert the counterintuitive to intuitive.
Some people are visual learners and others have a preferred learning modality of hearing or touch, so the idea of converting data displays to accommodate the preferred learning modality of the user would seem to indicate that data visualization might be more accurately described without the embedded word visual’. Perhaps data art?There is a fascinating image in Gordon Dickson’s book, The Final Encyclopedia, in which the encyclopedia is an interactive databank that displays the shifting information structures in a 3D holographic sensory barrage or light, movement, sound (texture?) that is so complex most people either can’t perceive it or it drives them nuts. The librarian was the person who could understand the visualization. There are people who combine data displays across a variety of senses. I have in mind Iannis Xenakis who converted mathematics, computer programs, and architectural designs into orchestral performance pieces. I once conceived a piece of music where the score was derived from a line drawing. Only the conductor could see the lines combine into the visual display, and the performers would see only the individual lines. Remember the message sticks from Australia or the kente/adinkra cloth from Ghana? Is visualization only analytical? Can visualization be art? Are the infographics that frequent the front page of Digg visualization or are they just pretty pictures? Can visualization be just a pretty picture? It seems to me that the answers are implied in the framing of the questions. Data visualization (or data art?) by definition is a combination of analysis and communication, both facilitating discovery on the part of either the creator or the audience. A data art creation (whether visual or auditory) can lean more towards analysis or more toward communication, but must contain elements of both.