Inspiration

Society Centred Design

If you work in the design space, or with designers, then you'll likely have heard of human-centred design [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human-centered_design]. It's a concept which states that well-designed products and services are those where the designer considers how people will use the

Generative Art

Mountain Drive

I spent a chunky part of the last 24 hours or so learning about noise. Specifically, about Perlin noise [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perlin_noise] -  a way to generate random numbers that feel more organic and less, well, random. When I learn something I like to use that

Inspiration

Active Participation

There was a great piece by Kevin Roose in the New York Times [https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/17/technology/coronavirus-how-to-live-online.html] last week, which has only just filtered through the streams to reach me. It's about how Covid-19 has forced us to use the internet in

Tools I Love

Tools I Love #4: Google Sheets

I don't know if I've ever made a visualization without Google Sheets [sheets.google.com]. Like the sturdy vessel of a seasoned explorer, it's fast, powerful, and a key part of almost every data journey I undertake. It's there with me when

Inspiration

The World As a Subway Map

The New York Times has published a good* scrollytelling piece about Covid-19, which makes use of particle flows to show how the virus spread from a single market in Wuhan to almost every country in the world [https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/03/22/world/coronavirus-spread.html]. It makes

Worknotes

Tenday Notes: 12-21 March 2020

Every ten days [https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Tenday] I share a quick digest of what I've been working on. Here's the latest. You can find more in the series here [https://blog.duncangeere.com/tag/tenday-notes/]. It's sometimes strange how projects move along

Music

In My Head

A few weeks back, I appeared on a local radio station for a show called "In Your Head [http://www.k103.se/program/inyourhead]". It's a bit like Desert Island Discs - they invite someone on the show, and get to know them through a playlist

Generative Art

Beachside 1

My generative art skills are progressing faster than they might otherwise, thanks to all the time freed up that I'd normally be spending hanging out with other humans. Every cloud and all that. Here's my latest piece, which employed a bunch of techniques I've

Writing

How to Identify Your Audience

Often when creating something to share information - a report, a blog post, a data visualization - we're told to ask ourselves who the audience for that thing is. It's an important step. Whatever you're making should be tailored to the people who'

Worknotes

Tenday Notes: 2-11 March 2020

Every ten days [https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Tenday] I share a quick digest of what I've been working on. Here's the latest. You can find more in the series here [https://blog.duncangeere.com/tag/tenday-notes/]. My work on the Drawdown project has been published!

From the Archive

From the Archive: Fowl Plague

Back in 2017, I worked on a series of articles about the risk of a major pandemic for How We Get To Next. The series was called Fowl Plague [https://howwegettonext.com/fowl-plague-82f020309aaa] - not my pun, unfortunately, but the original name for avian influenza when it was discovered in

Worknotes

Tenday Notes: 21 Feb - 1 Mar 2020

Every ten days [https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Tenday] I share a quick digest of what I've been working on. Here's the latest. You can find more in the series here [https://blog.duncangeere.com/tag/tenday-notes/]. A hundred days ago, I began following a new

Completed Work

Climate Change Solutions

Towards the end of 2019, the team at Project Drawdown [https://www.drawdown.org/] got in touch to ask if I could help them out with data visualization for an update to their best-selling compendium of climate change solutions [https://www.drawdown.org/the-book]. A chance to develop graphics for

Generative Art

Smoulder 1-5

I was making some generative versions of what I wanted my upcoming Carbon in Context graphic to vaguely look like. Then I put in some ridiculous values for the fun of it. One blur filter later, and I've got a set of images that capture how climate change

Generative Art

Sharing Generative Sketches

I've registered an Instagram account for my generative art sketches. Go check out @vhfseizures [https://www.instagram.com/vhfseizures/]. I'm not especially wild about using Instagram. Every third post in my feed is an ad these days, and often a crappy one at that. But it&

Sketchbook Pages

Sketchbook Pages #4

Finished my beautiful Moomin "Håll Sverige Rent" sketchbook [https://www.muminboden.se/varumarken/putinki/mumin-anteckningsbok-mini-hsr-bla.html] ! Now to figure out a filing scheme for posterity. In the meantime, here are the last few sketches it contains.

Behind the Scenes

Work in Progress #5

Mont Poupet and Nans Sous St Anne, in Franche Comte. Thanks to @humeursdevictor [https://twitter.com/humeursdevictor] for the link to better topographic data [https://www.data.gouv.fr/fr/datasets/bd-alti-r-75-m-250-m-1-000-m/] for France. The tiled heightmap for the whole country is a lovely mix of organic and synthetic, and

Behind the Scenes

Work in Progress #4

Anyone know a good source of high-resolution elevation data for France?

Worknotes

Tenday Notes: 11-20 Feb 2020

Every ten days [https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Tenday] I share a quick digest of what I've been working on. Here's the latest. You can find more in the series here [https://blog.duncangeere.com/tag/tenday-notes/]. I've been struggling to name a new

Code

Generative Design

Last week I ordered a new book, and yesterday it arrived. Generative Design [http://www.generative-gestaltung.de/2/] is a guide to creating generative art using the P5.js library. It includes a gentle tutorial on how to get started, but also a bunch of "recipes [http://www.generative-gestaltung.

Tools

How Big?

Hans Hack has developed a neat little tool [https://hanshack.com/geotools/howbig/] that lets you quickly draw a circle or square with a given area on a map, and download it as a GeoJSON. It's called "How Big". It's a handy way to

Sketchbook Pages

Sketchbook Pages #3

More pages from my sketchbook. I clearly don't know how to draw voronoi diagrams, but you get the idea. The line charts are my favourite!

Worknotes

Tenday Notes: 1-10 Feb 2020

Every ten days [https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Tenday] I share a quick digest of what I've been working on. Here's the latest. You can find more in the series here [https://blog.duncangeere.com/tag/tenday-notes/]. The last ten days have mostly been about finishing

Dataviz

Our Future on Earth

I worked on data visualization for a new FutureEarth [https://twitter.com/FutureEarth] report that connects recent news events with the latest environmental science research. Here's how it's described in the report itself: > This report provides a snapshot of our world at the start of

Tools I Love

Tools I Love #3: Figma

Here's a confession - I've never got comfortable with Adobe Illustrator. I'm pretty good with Photoshop. I've got a comfortable handle on Lightroom. But mastery of Illustrator has always eluded me. Why? Because it's bad software. It's slow,