#quantitative vs qualitative

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Quantitative vs Qualitative

Research: Quantitative vs Qualitative Background: Quantitative data can be measured and documented with numbers. Additionally, quantitative data can be represented as quantities. On the other hand, qualitative data is not measured with numbers, but it is represented by qualities. For example, I use quantitative methods to conduct my PhD research because I like working with counts and…

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Designing Data

Photo: Weather Portraits 2014, Nicholas Rougeux, 2015, http://www.c82.net/blog/?id=71

The idea of designing data and creating diagrams and collages out of quantitative information as opposed to qualitative is an uncommon one. Scientists and researchers unconsciously tend to separate themselves from designers and artists. The objective and subjective personalities are almost polar opposites, so it is not surprising that such a separation should exist. Yet this separation leaves a void in creativity. Scientists do not have the mind for aesthetics, and designers do not have mind for experiments and research. Left to their own devices scientists would create tables and charts without thought for presentation or beauty, only concerned that the information was there. Designers would only have the means to create imaginative works that are ultimately unconnected and meaningless to reality. By working together scientists and designers could create something relevant to everyone, rather than just the people who are mentally equipped to read their creations and appreciate them.

The above poster created by Nicholas Rougeux depicts the weather in 2014 in various cities in the United States. Each state is represented by a city, and I am quite pleased to say that Memphis represents Tennessee. As shown in the chart explaining the poster, the top half of each colorful circle represents the highest temperature, the lower half the lowest temperature, the size the range of temperatures, and the circle a day in the year. The line length represents the speed of the wind, and the line angle the source of the wind. All this data could be found elsewhere, in numbers in a table perhaps. It would be neatly laid out in black and white, but this is so much more interesting. Rougeux’s website details the process that he took to get to this design, and it is fascinating how many different ways other than a simple table of information he came up with to represent the same information. My favorites of his previous designs include Version 8, which looks like a bunch of mountains around a lake;

Version 11, which looks like a Jaw Breaker that’s been cut in half, or like a diagram of the layers of the Earth;

and Version 15, which is the closest of these three to his current version and the inspiration for the background color of the poster, since to him it looked like a diagram of the solar system.