INST104 Exam 2: Concept 2 - Design and Stories (Graphs, Journalism)

What Do Charts Do

Charts are tools to present information visually. They data raw data and help us make sense of it in a processed and organized manner.

What Kinds of Charts are There?

When Do I Use Which Chart?

Key Characteristics of Good Charts (2D-Static)

• Just enough data, not too much

• Present the right data, especially with geo maps

• Use the right graph

• Use the right colors

Charts Can Mislead

While charts can clarify information, they can also mislead (sometimes intentionally, sometimes through misunderstanding)

How Charts Work

“Any chart, no matter how well designed it might look, will mislead us if we don’t pay attention to it.” - Alberto Cairo

• Charts can lie to us, pay attention and learn to read them cautiously. Charts/visualizations, are also based on a vocabulary of symbols + conventions that need to be known.

Designers and Journalists

• Designers and journalist must visualize data transparently and responsibly

• Audiences must learn to question and verify information.

• Visual literacy is a civic skill, essential in an era of misinformation and polarized media.

• If we learn to read harts well, we can make better decisions, demand better information, and resist manipulation.

How to Make a Good Chart

• Start with the story, not the chart

  • What chart fits the data, not the other way around

  • Be clear on what you are trying to present from the beginning

• Keep it simple with all non-essentials removed

• Label everything

• Remember that Clarity Beats Cleverness (go for a simple boring charts rather than a beautiful one that confuses people)

Action is at the heart of Interaction

• Both storytelling + design have action at the heart of their processes

• We are telling stories through our designs.

• Examples:

  • What can this product or service do for people?

  • What can people do with it?

  • What actions does a product enable?

Stories Ask Questions and Delay Answers

• Finding the answer yields a satisfying ending

• No different from bridging the Gulf of Execution (what can I do?) and the Gulf of Evolution (what just happened?)

Narrative Arc

Created by Gustav Freytag, a German playwright and novelist.

Divided into five parts

1. Exposition

2. Rising Action

3. Climax

4. Falling Action

5. Conclusion

Designers can use the rising and falling to emphasize large and small actions.

Web Designer - Apple’s Product Pages (narrative arc)

• Exposition: The page opens with clean visuals and a simple, bold statement.

• Rising Action: As you scroll, dynamic animations introduce the technical details, chip performance, battery life, display, each building excitement.

• Climax: The story peaks with cinematic visuals or videos showing the product in action.

• Falling Action and Resolution: The bottom of the page returns to calm, specs, purchase options, and subdued tones that provide closure.

Architecture - Daniel Libeskind’s Jewish Museum, Berlin (narrative arc)

• Exposition: Visitors enter through an ordinary-looking building,

representing pre-war normalcy.

• Rising action: As visitors descend into the zigzagging underground

corridors, the architecture becomes disorienting; slanted walls, dead

ends, and voids evoke fragmentation and loss.

• Climax: The “Holocaust Tower,” a tall, dark, unheated void lit only by

a slit of light, represents the emotional peak.

• Falling action and resolution: Visitors ascend back into daylight,

emerging into galleries that reflect survival and continuity.

Spaceship Designer - SpaceX’s Dragon Capsule (narrative arc)

• Exposition: Boarding begins in calm white interiors, minimalist lighting. A

prelude to flight.

• Rising action: During liftoff, the lighting and screen interfaces subtly shift;

vibration and acceleration heighten tension.

• Climax: During orbit, the displays transition to a serene earth-view

interface, signifying success.

• Falling action/resolution: After docking, lighting softens, systems quiet

down moving from adrenaline to tranquility.

The Hero’s Journey Origin

Created by Joseph Campbell, an American mythology professor.

A universal pattern in myths and stories across various cultures and time periods

The Hero’s Journey Tool

The main premise is that a hero is taken away from the ordinary life into an adventure.

We can translate this design in which any product or service has a plot

Designers ask themselves:

• What is the desire action?

• How does the user complete the action?

Steps of Hero’s Journey

• Ordinary World

• Call to Adventure

• Crossing the Threshold

• Approach to the Inmost Cave

• Ordeal

• Reward

• The Road Back (Boon)

• Resurrection

The Hero's Journey (IKEA edition)

• Ordinary World - Regular life, parking lot

• Call to Adventure - Moving + need new furniture, hungry

• Crossing the Threshold - Escalator

• Approach to the Inmost Cave - Models

• Ordeal - Maze, shopping

• Reward - Candy

• The Road Back (Boon) - Checkout

• Resurrection - Hotdog, meatballs

A hero who embarks on a journey to create a better living space, maybe a

quest for a desk chai, facing challenges in home furnishing. They must endure a gauntlet of living room vignettes and kitchen scenarios before finding the office section receiving guidance from IKEA's products and services, and ultimately achieving a transformed home environment.

Storyboarding Tool

• Designers use storyboards to communicate their ideas to

clients and even collaborators.

• Designers aim to explain action with a concise series of pictures, a storyboard.

  • How does the story begin and end/ What is the setting?

  • Where are the story’s points of greatest intensity?

• Used to think through a problem.

• Great for planning the transformative action of a story.

• Make simple drawings.sketches just to get the whole story down.