My Own Giant World Map

I spend nearly a year on this personal project to create a giant map of the world to dominate a wall in my living room (it’s 2.85m x 1.5m / nearly 9.5’ x 5’).

For nearly a decade I had the large IKEA world map in my living room. I loved standing right in front of it and wondering what places I might want to visit one day. After I moved, there was a large blank wall in the new living room, and there were always some things that I wanted to see different (aesthetically) from the IKEA map. And so, during many evenings, scattered in several bursts across the past year, I started working on my own version of a world map, an even bigger one. Adding more details (such as the terrain of the oceans), more labels, more details, more color! (It's based on open-source datasets such as Natural Earth).

I loved finally being able to decide exactly what I wanted to see on a map (hello volcanos, more mountains, glaciers, etc.). What colors I would enjoy most (also determined by the green and brown colors in the rest of the interior). Although it did take me a really long time to figure out what level of details was enough (and at what point the files got too big too load...). And label placement, oof... 😵 But I'm glad that is all behind me and I can now enjoy looking at this map in my room whenever I want.

(I’m aware that the Miller projection I’m using is far from perfect, but I had one constraint: I wanted the map to fill a rectangle)

You can read more about its creation process (and see more photos) on the portfolio page:

Check out more of the Map Here

Giveaway time!

I'm giving away a version of my world map! I have another. Sort of. The version hanging in my house is v2. Version 1 is nearly perfect too, but due to a miscommunication the sides were wrapped a little too far into the aluminium frame, so a small part of the map gets lost in the fold (a tiny sliver of New Zealand's North Island, and some of the degree markings along the edges). Nothing that ruins the experience (you're still getting well over 95% of the map). However, it meant I was allowed to order a new one, which I did, with a couple of small tweaks (notably, I changed from a map that runs from exactly from -180 (left) to 180 (right), to one where the cutoff is more along the split between Russia and Alaska). The photos below shows v1 of the map:

So now the v1 map one is looking for a new home!

One thing to know upfront: it does NOT come with a frame. If you want to hang it as a print like in the photos above, you'd need to order an aluminium frame separately, which costs about €426 through Art Heroes (you can contact their customer service to order just the frame). Not cheap, I know! But it's also a very large, high-quality textile canvas and frame. However, there are plenty of other things you could do with it beyond hanging it on a wall. The giveaway isn't only for those that would want to hang it on a wall (although if you do, that's fine too, I'd then love to hear where you're going to place it. In your home, the office, public library, …?). You might also turn the textile canvas into something wearable? Get creative :)

✉️ To enter: send me an email at info@visualcinnamon.com and tell me what you'd do with it. I'll pick the idea that speaks to me most. No strict criteria, just whatever makes me smile or think "yes, that's the right home for this map."

• Due to shipping (and my luck with postal services) this is open to a shipping address in the EU only, sorry!

• Deadline to reply: The end of this weekend, June 7th 2026

Visualizing Climate Action Research | TAC

I was approached by the Transforming Climate Action program, a team of researchers from four Canadian universities (Dalhousie University, Université du Québec à Rimouski, Université Laval, and Memorial University) working together to support just and equitable climate adaption, advance responsible marine carbon dioxide removal science and reduce critical uncertainty in the climate system.

The team overseeing the massive project was looking for a visual way to show how the researchers were connected through collaborations across various projects, specifically when they were from very different scientific disciplines.

The resulting highly interactive network is an inviting and playful way to encourage exploration and discovery of the people, projects and impacts within the program. You can hover and click on nodes to discover details, filter by discipline or project, and more.

Explore the Network Here

(or read more about the project on my portfolio page)

The Best-Selling Nintendo Switch Games

I worked on this small personal project in 2024, but I never got around to sharing it until now. It shows the top 10 best-selling Nintendo Switch games, as of June 2024. When they were released (position on the diagonal line), their genre (“color”) and the number of sold copies (size).

You might notice that it looks different in style than my normal visuals, it’s 3D! That’s because it was created with Blender (instead of d3.js, what I normally work with). I made this specifically for my (then upcoming) book CHART about creative data visualization, showing how you can look outside of the “standard” tools and software and be inspired by other fields to create interesting and unique visualizations of data.

I haven’t gotten around to making another visual in Blender since sadly, but I do keep it in the back of my mind for any new project I work on as a potential option.

See More Close-Ups & Video Here

An in-depth review of CHART

My latest book, CHART, got an in-depth review by Melissa Strong through the Open Visualization Academy. So in case you were still doubting if the book was a good match for you, I’d highly recommend reading her thoughts about it.

Read the Review Here

That’s it again for now. If you happen to be going to the dataviz conference &MOVE next week in The Netherlands, see you there!

PS: I’ll be giving a keynote at the PyData conference in Amsterdam this September. And I’ve created a brand new presentation that dives into the entire behind-the-scenes of my recent Searching for Birds project (showing Google Docs filled with chart screenshots, notebooks with sketches and some d3.js live coding) that I’ll be giving at another dataviz conference in the fall (but I’m not officially announced yet, so I can’t say more ;) )

Hopefully see you next time with more updates!

Searching for Birds | Google Trends

With the Global/Great Backyard Bird Count happening this weekend (join up, it’s fun!) the timing couldn’t be better for the release of my latest project. For several months I got to dive into the wide world of bird data, thanks to Google Trends, to finally emerge with an interactive exploration about how humans connect to birds by searching for them and identifying them.

I think this might be the biggest, and maybe even the most creative project I’ve ever worked on and I’m very proud of the result full of whimsical, highly custom and fun visualizations where you can get lost in exploring all that the data has to offer.

Check out “Searching for Birds” Here

There’s a giant nest, a giant egg, a US map made of eggs, an ai bird identification helper, and more fun visuals to play with. I hope that, even if you’re not a bird person, you’ll enjoy casually learning more about the many flying fluffy feathery balls (and some are honestly too cute) we have in our world.

Searching for Birds

(As I’m self-publishing this, I would really really appreciate it if you would share it with others in case you found the story a fun read worth passing on 🙏 Thank you!)

A big thank you to Emily Barone who took my mountain of plots and initial thoughts for a story and scratched it all to come up with, and write a fantastic story tying all the most interesting results together.

Visualizing Neglect | The END Fund

The second big project is a long-form, highly interactive data-driven article on “Neglected Tropical Diseases” that I created for The END Fund. It celebrates the quiet, historic progress made against neglected tropical diseases and spotlights why missing data tells a story of those most impacted by NTDs. Often women and marginalized groups, some of the most impoverished groups in the world, pay the price for this neglect.

It’s hard to capture this project in still images, there’s a map, glyphs in a grid, line charts, and an elaborate scrollytelling piece that introduces each of the six NTDs and their effect on people, while also showing the progress being made, and what still needs to be done to END them once and for all. I hope you’ll take the time to look at the result:

Explore “Visualizing Neglect” Here

Giant Wall-sized Data Artworks | DNV

I’m very happy that I’ve been able to work on several data artworks over the past year! I sincerely hope that trend continues into this year 🤞 For this piece I created two data artworks that would span two walls of a new office space for DNV (~ 3 x 4 m).

I used data that they had recently published about the past and future energy transition, specifically for the marine sector (I developed several water-based concepts). You can see more of the artworks, concept sketches, and the explanation on how to “read” them with the link below.

See More of the Artworks Here

CHART Interview with Tamara and Alberto

I got to (video) chat with Tamara Munzner and Alberto Cairo about my recent book CHART. We talk in-depth about ways to be more creative in the visualization of data; how to balance effectiveness with uniqueness, how to make an audience look at your chart and make it memorable. I also touch upon the design of the book, my influences and some easter eggs hidden throughout the book ^_^

See the Interview Here

That’s it again for now!

If you happen to get a copy of CHART, I’d love to see any photos or hear your thoughts! Feel free to tag me on LinkedIn, Bluesky, X, or instagram (or send me an email if you’d prefer)

Hopefully see you next time with more updates!

A Data Art Collection About the Foods We Eat | Intake

I got to create a six-piece data art collection for the GDQS Country Story Book by Intake, turning their “Global Diet Quality Score” data (the ingredients that a person eats in a day) from over 80,000 people across 23 countries into colorful data artworks. Each artwork translates their 25 GDQS food/ingredient groups into distinct visual motifs, such as wavy white lines for the Whole Grains group or bold red circles for Red Meat, weaving data and design into a portrait of how the world eats.

The centerpiece shows what a single person ate in a day as a vibrant ring. Stacking thousands of such rings together reflects the variety and amount of foods people from all over the world have eaten in a single day. The resulting circular form evokes the familiar image of a plate of food as seen from above.

The other five artworks dive into themes like animal-source foods, fruits, and sweets, drawing on familiar shapes like lollipops and fruit slices. Together, the series celebrates the beauty, diversity, and culture behind global diets.

See All the Artworks Here

Data Stories | Publications Office of the European Union

The Publications Office of the European Union invited me to design data visualizations for three of their monthly Data Stories, each exploring a different theme through the EU’s open data.

The first story, A Promising Horizon, looks ahead to the 2025–2027 Horizon Europe strategic plan and its investments in areas like the circular economy, space, and AI. The second, Leisure in Europe, takes a lighter tone, revealing how people across the EU spend their free time, from dining out to cultural activities. The third, Health and Well-being in the EU, focuses on prevention, disease burden, and access to care.

Although the brief mentioned that straightforward charts were more then fine, I tried to make sure that each looked visually appealing and memorable, including one of my favorite lesser-used chart forms like Voronoi treemaps.

Check Out All Nine Charts Here

CHART | More Updates!

My new book CHART has been out for a few months now ✨ (thank you to those who shared their photos and thoughts online, the feedback has made the whole grueling process of writing a book all worth it!). I have a few small updates to share:

• I’ve created a dedicated subpage on my website where you can find a link to an exclusive preview of the book (see the last section all the way down the page) in case you’d like to see what you’re getting if you’re still considering to get CHART.

• Neil Richards wrote an extensive review about CHART where you can see more photos about all that appears on the book ^_^

• I also had the pleasure to appear on the Storytelling with Data podcast talking more about the book, in case you prefer listening to reading.

See the CHART Site Here!

New Blog! | The Top Contributor Network

It’s been a while, but I finally wrote one of my extensive design blogs again! For this one I dive into the creation of the “Top Contributor Network” that I created for Mozilla. It goes all the way from the start and very first works in progress through all the ups and downs before ending up at the final design.

Read the Full Blog Here

That’s it again for now!

PS, the campaign for which I created the Methane Circle is up for a Shorty Award! In case you have some time, I’d highly appreciate if you could please give it a vote, thank you!

If you happen to get a copy of CHART, I’d love to see any photos or hear your thoughts! Feel free to tag me on LinkedIn, Bluesky, X, or instagram (or send me an email if you’d prefer)

Hopefully see you next time with more updates!

CHART is Released! | Virtual launch party at Outlier on June 11th

My new book about “Designing Creative Data Visualizations from Charts to Art” is officially released today! Although I’ve already seen a few photos of physical copies appear online here and there (lucky you! I haven’t gotten mine even!), which caused a bit of a freak out when the first photos I saw showed a black and white interior (thankfully that appeared to have been a rogue proof copy which is now a special collectors item ;) ).

For those who are new here, a quick recap: The book consists of thirteen lessons and six mini chapters that go through my personal learnings and favorite techniques. I’m using examples from my personal and client projects from across the past decade to highlight the approach of each lesson. I wanted the physical book to be something you’d proudly display on any table or book case, so it’s hardcopy be default and is gorgeously designed to hopefully excite your eyeballs while you’re learning about data visualization.

You can buy the book here!

Oh, and get 20% off at my publisher’s site with the code 25AFLY2 ✨

Because CHART started out as a keynote speech for Outlier back in 2023, it felt fitting to have it be released right before Outlier 2025 and have a little (virtual) launch party at the conference!

So if you’re going to attend Outlier and want to learn more about the book, what’s inside, how it looks, what it takes to write a book, and ask me any questions, come join my (Zoom) launch “party” on June 11th at 12:30pm EST / 18:30 CEST!

A Timeline of All Commits to any GitHub Repo | Mozilla

In my previous newsletter I shared a GitHub repository related interactive visual that I created for/with Mozilla Builders. But I got to create a second one! The first looked into the synergies of the top contributors. This one shows a timeline of all the commits made to any repository, grouped by month, and giving an indication of the number of lines removed and/or added (here’s the version for d3.js!)

Play With the Visual!

TimeForCH4nge | Environmental Defense Fund

I got to create a data art system for the Environmental Defense Fund #TimeForCH4nge campaign. The art pieces shows you how much methane was added to the atmosphere for each year that you've been alive. It creates a unique artwork for each date of birth, using inspiration from the gaseous state of methane and the elegant simplicity of the famous Climate Stripes.

Create Your Personal Methane Circle Here!

Safeguarding Historical Sites | IHRA

For the release of the “Charter for Safeguarding Sites” by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) I created an interactive data visualization that reveals the sixteen threats, risks and challenges outlined in the Charter and how different Holocaust sites are facing different combinations of these threats, but also the various solutions to these threats. By hovering over any threat or site, the visual reveals what solutions can help to mitigate the threats. Design and color-wise this project was quite the challenge, as this is of course not the topic where I should apply (my usual) tendency to go for very vibrant colors.

See the Visual Here

That’s it again for now! I’ll save some other projects for the next newsletter.

If you happen to get a copy of CHART, I’d love to see any photos or hear your thoughts! Feel free to tag me on LinkedIn, Bluesky, X, or instagram (or send me an email if you’d prefer)

Hopefully see you next time with more updates!

Oh right, before I forget, I’ve written a new book!!

CHART | Designing Creative Data Visualizations from Charts to Art

If you’ve been seeing some of my posts come by on LinkedIn (where I’m somehow now “most active” of all my social channels) this won’t come as a surprise. But for those who haven’t, which I’m guessing is the majority of readers, I’m happy to announce that I’ve written a brand new book! As the subtitle alludes, it is all about how to add (a bit) more creativity to any type of data visualization. Whether that is a subtle touch to the more straightforward (business) charts or when creating data art, and every type of data visualization in between.

Thanks to the luminary insight from a good friend, it’s simply called CHART, because I honestly never realized that the word “art” is hidden within it until she pointed it out to me a few months ago while I talked about my struggles to find a name for the book.

The book consists of thirteen lessons and six mini chapters that go through my personal learnings and favorite techniques. I’m using examples from my personal and client projects from across the past decade to highlight the approach of each lesson.

As this book is all about creativity and making your charts look unique, memorable and beautiful, I simply had to hire Julie Brunet (creative editor of Nightingale’s printed edition) to turn the design of this book into something you’d want to put on display, and gosh, did she deliver!

I handed in the PDF-ready files last week and the book should be coming out at the end of May, so only two months away!

Check out the Book on the Publisher’s website

It’ll be a hardcover by default btw ✨

If you can’t wait, you can already read the foreword that (the series co-editor) Alberto Cairo wrote in his newsletter.

Visualizing GitHub Repositories | Mozilla

I worked together with Mozilla Builders to create a highly interactive network visualization revealing the top contributors to any repository and the other projects they’ve worked on, highlighting synergies across repos.

This visual shows how contributors deeply involved in one repository (e.g., PDF.js) often play key roles in other important projects. By awarding ORCA benefits (see next paragraph) to these impactful contributors, the hope is to create a ripple effect. Giving them the time to improve even more open-source projects.

For this project, I collaborated with Adam Bouhenguel, the creator of ORCA (Open Retrospective Compensation Agreement). ORCA enables businesses to share a portion of their revenue with contributors of the open-source projects they rely on.

Play with the Visual

The Amsterdam Startup Landscape | Cæmpus

I got to dive into the 300+ startups that ACE and three Amsterdam Universities have coached over the past decade; what technology, how many employees, any funding, are they still around today? I got to present these findings (as the above slide) during the soft-relaunch/rebrand of ACE to Cæmpus last summer.

See More of the Visual

The Exoplanet Radius Gap | Scientific American

I’m always thrilled when I get to work on science-related visuals, especially when it’s astronomy! So I was very excited when Scientific American reached out to ask me to make a two-page spread for their article on the puzzling lack of planets (outside of our solar system) in a certain size range; the “Radius Gap”

The final visual might look like a standard x-y scatterplot, but it’s actually a polar plot, but with such a very large radius and a small angular section. As the vertical “y-axis” (the radius in the polar plot) represented the radius of the exoplanets, I felt that giving the chart a slight circular curve would be a nice fit.

Read the Article on Scientific American

I actually have several more things to share (A 3D viz in Blender, a whole data art collection!). However, this newsletter is already too long as it is. Instead, I’ll try and release two more newsletters within the next few months with all my other updates, so I can also keep you a bit more up-to-date about anything exciting happening around the book’s release.

Hopefully until soon again!

I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas | DataViz Christmas Card

I've had this idea in mind to create a data visualization-inspired Christmas card to send out to all the people I've collaborated with since the first year I started Visual Cinnamon. And then it somehow took seven whole years before I finally found took the time to create the first! But better late than never ^_^

I sent the card out yesterday with a personal message to each person I’ve created a custom visualization for over the years (It took the whole day!). But I also wanted to share this card with you.

If you're like me, you're probably also hoping for a white Christmas

I'm especially excited this year, as I've moved to a new house in the forest (a dream come true), so I can only imagine how magical the garden would look.

And so, for my (first) Christmas card, I reveal at which large (capital) cities it has snowed on Christmas day for the past 50 years.

Check out the (interactive) Christmas Card!

Embracing the Taboo | Article for Nightingale

The printed version of Nightingale is a work of art in itself. The content, typography, illustrations, and layout are all sublime! When it was announced that the third issue would be about “guidelines,” a thought formed in my head to (finally) try and send in an article. I created a new data visualization using (gasp!) 3D bars to reveal the height of the tallest buildings in the world. In a short article to accompany the dataviz, I explain how (and when) you can embrace even the biggest taboos.

See More Details of the Visualization & Article

25 Years of Dark Energy | Scientific American

I got to create the cover art for “The Cosmic Surprise,” an article going into the 25 years since dark energy was discovered, for the December issue of Scientific American. Using the freely available data from the DESI (Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument) Early Data Release (and some hours of figuring out what the heck I was dealing with and how to use it), I plotted ±1.6 million dots that represent the objects that DESI has observed so far (almost all entire galaxies!). I love the look of the "beams" coming from the center as if we're pointing a flashlight out into space and seeing what’s there.

Read the Full Article on SciAm

Coiling Curves Puzzles | Artifact Puzzles

As a jigsaw puzzle lover, I was excited when Artifact Puzzles reached out to me to ask if they could create some jigsaw puzzles with my art. They create high-quality wooden jigsaw puzzles using original art from a variety of artists. We looked at the options in my portfolio, and the Coiling Curves collection seemed like it could be a great fit for some puzzles with a fun twist on the typical “gradient puzzle” while also having a unique shape. As a fully biased person, I can say that I had a blast putting these together :)

See All the Puzzles in the Series

Shop | Data Visualization Art Prints

Just a reminder that you can find data visualization (and astronomy) prints of several of my projects in my online shop. From spirographs, Hubble, sky maps, visualizing pi, and more. The posters are printed on thick, textured archival paper with vibrant inks and utter crisp resolution that look great when framed. Great as a gift for a loved one/friend/colleague!

(PS: there’s also a page that shows the signed prints available ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ )

Explore the Shop

I’ve decided to focus on client work again, as the ongoing house renovations are too intense to take on anything relating to data art or exhibitions for now (they are quite mentally taxing on me). I have some availability in the new year, so if you want a custom, creative, (interactive), and unique visual of your data to use for those important moments and places, feel free to reach out!

Merry Christmas, and I wish you a lovely 2024!

But there’s also dataviz! I created two elaborate animations about the rise of solar panels in Switzerland.

BTW, I switched to Substack for my newsletters! Fingers crossed this process has gone smoothly…

wavʌves | N=12 | Feral File

As part of the N=12 group exhibition with 11 other amazing artist on Feral File, I created “wavʌves” (pronounced waves), which opened up today! It goes back to some of my favorite style elements; embracing the flatness of shapes, with a slight sense of unperfection, while including a vibrant color palette. All in the style of some Mid-Century Modern art, which I’ve really come to love over the past few months while looking into interior design (we’ve just moved!).

Check out wavʌves

Fleeting Thoughts | Flatlands | Alba

At the end of June “Fleeting Thoughts” was released as part of the Flatlands exhibition on Alba.art. Wanting to start out by “creating chunky shapes that roughly follow a certain path”, it evolved into a collection that, to me, represents the workings of our inner mind. Again embracing the “perfect flatness” of the digital realm, combined with vibrant color palettes.

See the Collection of 100 Pieces

Imagine | Axiom Space

To celebrate the Ax-2 mission to the ISS this past May, I created “Imagine” a collection of fictional star maps that transport viewers to worlds yet to be discovered. Each map is completely unique and has dozens of constellations waiting to be named.

See More from “Imagine”

GenCoop | Swissgrid

I created two elaborate animations for Swissgrid about solar panels; One shows the immense rise of solar panels over the past 35 years since the first was registered in 1988. While the second one reveals a model of the expected daily energy production of each panel across 2022 using local weather data. I incorporated the “contour line” design throughout the visual and animations, hopefully turning this into something the audience would remember :)

Check out the Project

And that was it again for now! I’m just starting on a big dataviz project for an exciting client that I hope to show you some WIP from in the coming month (on Twitter probably). But I will also have to balance the coming weeks (months?) with the immense house renovations that just got started last week, wish me luck… (I had no idea you could overwork the joints in your fingers(?!), from all the lifting and cleaning o.O)

See you again in a few months with a new update!

+ some sneak peeks at what I’m working on now!

Mapping (my data in) Norway | Personal

Last year I traveled through Norway for 5 months, working on the bad days, and hiking on the good ones. Starting in the South and slowly moving North as summer came around. To commemorate this trip, I created a map of my favorite part of the whole trip. I loved all of Norway, but Senja, Lofoten & Vesterålen really stole my heart.

Using R, the OpenStreetMap API, and more open data sources and tools, I created this map layer by (geoJson) layer. I’m also an avid “activity tracker” with my smartwatch and added all of our hikes to the map in red. This made me realize that there is even more personal/quantified self data that I could add, such as the Google Location History, the ferry crossings, and the locations we stayed overnight. And so this map became a really personal piece that I had printed and is now hanging in our hallway.

Check out the Map!

The Essence of Us | Data Art

I was asked to participate in an exhibition about culture. And it might’ve been the astronomer in me, but my mind wandered over to thinking about “What defines human culture? As a whole?” Through a thought process that touched upon the Drake Equation, aliens, and more, I came to exoplanets. I wanted to use all the 5000+ exoplanets discovered so far for the final artwork, using inspiration from space (and the 90s for the design, the first being discovered in 1992).

I converted each exoplanet into a swirl, using its data to determine every visual aspect. They all move around the center, around Earth. Slowly moving, it guides your eyes to the center while you can think about that initial question “What defines human culture as a whole?”

See the Animated Version!

Milky Way Census | Scientific American

I’m glad how often clients reach out for astronomy projects (honestly, there can never be enough astronomy data visualizations for me!). For this piece about the new data release of the Gaia project (which has mapped over a billion objects to date!) I created a visual about ±85,000 of the stars nearest to us and how they differ in their size, luminosity, age, and more.

See more Close-ups of the Visual

Shop | Data Visualization Art Prints

Just a reminder that you can find data visualization (and astronomy) prints of several of my projects in my online shop. From spirographs, Hubble, sky maps, visualizing pi, and more. The posters are printed on thick, textured archival paper with vibrant inks and utter crisp resolution that look great when framed.

(PS: there’s also a page that shows the signed prints available ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ )

Explore the Shop

Sneak Peeks

I’m currently working on three new collections! All generative art this time, one about space even! I’m at the start of all three of them, but really excited about where I’ll be taking them. If you’d like to follow their evolution, follow me on Twitter (or Instagram), where I’ll try to share lots of work-in-progress shots.

See you again in a few months with a new update!

If you’re near Amsterdam during the next 4 days, see further down how you can get a free ticket to the Affordable Art Fair, where several of my artworks are exhibited!

Patchwork Kingdoms | UNICEF

“Patchwork Kingdoms” is a data & generative art charity collection that I created for the Giga Connect project of UNICEF. All proceeds from the sale went to this project, which aims to connect all of the schools in the world to the Internet.

The Giga project has a dataset of 1 million schools; for ±280,000, they know if the schools are connected to the internet. I took this data about the schools, split them into 1000 subsets, and turned each school into a tiny square. All the squares together build up into two separate kingdoms, where those in the upright kingdoms are schools that are already connected to the internet, while those in the hidden / upside-down kingdoms are not. Each of the 1000 pieces is thereby showing the “digital divide” that still exists in our world.

Check out the Project

I also wrote a (very long, as usual) design blog post that goes into the design, creation and the nitty-gritty detail of how I’ve incorporated the data from the schools into the final design.

Gravitational Waves | Science News

Thankfully I also got to work on an astronomy data visualization! First discovered in 2015, LIGO and Virgo have since detected 50 gravitational wave events. These ripples through space-time itself are caused by the violent collisions of black holes (and/or neutron stars) dating back billions of years.

To celebrate the release of the 2nd catalog of mergers, Science News asked me to create an interactive data visualization revealing each event together with a companion for their printed magazine. We wanted to make the interactive part more special than a static visual. The final visual includes sound bites for some mergers even! Hovering over a merger starts a tiny (physics-based) animation of the merger. Clicking on any merger shows a pop-up modal with a lot more detailed information, such as a map of the sky that shows the rough location of where the gravitational waves originated from. So, lots to play with and explore!

Go to the Article

Data Art Collections

If you’ve been following me, you might have seen that I’ve been trying to move more and more toward data art for some time now. After experiencing how difficult it was to find client work in data art, I quit working for 6 months to study at the Fab Academy at the start of 2021. Expanding my skills and taking some time to think.

After finishing the Fab Academy, I noticed that several of the generative artists that I follow on Twitter had been experimenting with NFTs. I had no idea what this was, but it seemed interesting what the artists were doing, so I investigated. It didn’t take long for me to realize how fascinating the concept of NFTs was, a way to have an artist’s autograph on a digital art piece (that’s how I like to see it when having to explain in one sentence). And you could even have the code itself become a permanent part of the blockchain; how cool (and appropriate)!

Seeing how this could potentially give me a way to work on data art for a living, I decided to dive in and see how it would go.

I started creating small collections, such as Elemental Flows (hiding data about the natural elements) and Wanderings of Stars (showing how stars will move for hundreds of thousands of years into the past or future).

I also created a long-form collection, where I program an algorithm that will output a different visual result depending on the “seed” (a random number) you start with, called Wanderlust. It takes the transactional data from each Ethereum block in the blockchain and converts it into a unique image, visualizing several aspects of each transaction.

And the Patchwork Kingdoms mentioned before using data about schools and their internet connectivity.

I’ve been immensely enjoying creating these data art collections and hope to continue working on such collections for a long time.

See my new “Art” page

Generative Art Collections

Besides data art, I’ve also started to explore generative art. For me, it’s very similar to data art in an abstract sense. However, instead of having data to guide the visual aspects of the work, I use random numbers. Sometimes it’s just nice not having to worry about gathering, cleaning, and adjusting a dataset ;)

One of my first bigger collections was Anhedra, where I was inspired by the process by which minerals (and rocks) are created, especially when growth occurs in a competitive environment.

And over the past year, I’ve created collections that are inspired by spirographs (which have always fascinated me) with Rotae and Amorphous Symmetry. And more recently, by the simple Archimedean spiral with the Twistings collection.

I also couldn’t stay away from astronomy and started with some of the Hubble Space Telescope’s most famous photos. It takes them to an abstract level, returning them to their most basic shapes and colors in the Dreams of Hubble collection.

And finally, simply drawing millions upon millions of tiny dots that seem to form triangles and hard edges when brought together in my Obscured collection.

If you’re interested in owning any of the pieces in these collections, you can find links to the different marketplaces on each of their portfolio pages (the textual links each go to their respective portfolio page) under the “NFT links” header.

Affordable Art Fair / Amsterdam

Between 26 – 30 October 2022, the Affordable Art Fair takes place in the Kromhouthal in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Thousands of contemporary artworks can be seen, all priced under €7,500. You can browse works by artists exhibited in local, national, and international galleries.

I’m honored to have several of my works exhibited as part of Thud Studio (booth C9), where you can find four exclusive Patchwork Kingdoms that are framed and signed (the only four I’ve signed) and a big lush Wanderlust piece that is expertly framed with an epoxy layer on top, and more.

Shop | Data Visualization Art Prints

Just a reminder that you can find data visualization prints of several of my projects in my online shop. From spirographs, sky maps, visualizing pi, and more. The giclee posters are printed on lovely thick, textured archival paper with vibrant inks that don’t fade.

There’s free worldwide shipping on all posters! (there’s also a page that shows the signed prints available ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ )

Explore the shop

See you again in a few months (hopefully less than a year) with a new update!

Data Sketches | The Book

It finally happened! (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:・ﾟ✧ The book following the Data Sketches project that my collaborator Shirley Wu and I worked on since 2016 came out last February!

Ever since Shirley and I started Data Sketches, we've dreamed of creating a beautiful coffee table book with large, indulgent images of our projects, side-by-side with our technical process write-ups, and it’s finally here!

We’re extremely proud of the (giant, literally!) book, both in terms of the content and how it looks, having worked closely with amazing artist Alice Lee for the gorgeous cover and agency Praline to really lift the internal design to the next level.

There’s a 20% sale going on at our publisher Routledge right now, and there might even be a few last signed copies available (^▽^) You can order a signed copy by filling in this form (using the code SS120 you’ll also get a 20% discount!)

Go to the Website

How to Make Almost Anything | Fab Academy

I stopped working for the first half of 2021 to study at the Fab Academy, also known as the course on ‘How to Make (almost) Anything,’ a 20-week full-time course during which you learn how to become a maker. I learned how to design for, and create with, laser cutters, 3D printers, and milling machines, make my own electronics, and more. For my final project, I made a jigsaw puzzle that incorporates light effects underneath the pieces, and whenever a new piece is placed on the board (♥‿♥)

If you’d like to know what else I made, I created a dedicated website with giant write-ups on what I learned, what machines I used, and what weekly project I made; from Archimedean Solids made from cardboard, a 3D-printed jewelry collection, a big wooden curved ceiling light, and much more.

I also wrote a (shorter) blog post that summarizes what you learn each week and what I created, explaining how a typical week looks, in case you might be interested in Fab Academy.

Check out the Blog

A Year of Electrical Grid Data | Swissgrid

The biggest piece of data art that I’ve ever created, literally!

Swissgrid, the national transmission system operator in Switzerland, reached out to me because they wanted to explore an artistic way to visualize the data that is generated in their extra-high-voltage network of electrical grids. With over 60 million data points from the year 2019, it was quite a challenge to find the right balance of aggregating values while still showing as much detail as possible.

The final result, called “Landscape of Power Flows,” became a giant work of 2m x 2.7m, printed on acrylic glass, and is now hanging in the lobby of Swissgrid’s main office in Aarau.

You can see more images of the piece up close in my portfolio, and read a little about its creation here.

Space Wars | Scientific American

I can never get enough of working on space and astronomy-related data visualizations! I was, therefore really happy that I got to work on this piece for the ‘Space Wars’ article in Scientific American, revealing as much as I could about all the active satellites in space. Adding details about satellite size to function, the country that owns it, which orbit, what class (defense, commercial, …), and more.

Check out the Visual

Interview | Designing Data Visualizations

Oliver Lindberg interviewed me for Shaping Design. One of my favorite interviews, possibly my favorite one, because it packs in so many different aspects without getting too long. This piece reveals all the tools I use, my general workflow, and how I switched from astronomy to dataviz in the first place, with a short intro going into one of my favorite projects, visualizing all of Hubble’s observations.

Read the Full Interview

Shop | DataViz Prints & Generative Pen Plots

Just a reminder that you can find data visualization prints of several of my projects in my online shop. From spirographs, sky maps, visualizing pi, and more. The giclee posters are printed on lovely thick, textured archival paper with vibrant inks that don’t fade.

There’s free worldwide shipping on all posters, while you’ll get a few goodies in the envelope if you choose a pen plot instead.

Explore the Shop!

See you again in a few months with a new update!

A Data Art System | Sony Music Entertainment

I was extremely excited when Sony Music reached out to me with the idea to use data to design modern record certification plaques, those "Gold" and "Platinum" records that celebrate milestones in the journey of a song or an album.

Using inspiration from the typical look of a gold record, I created a data art system for Sony Music that creates a unique (40x50cm) poster with the data from a song; using data from Spotify's streams, charts, playlists, audio & feature analyses, Youtube streams and even data taken from the song itself.

You can already find (giant, printable) posters for 6 songs in the release blog that Sony Music wrote for it. They were also kind enough to include the creation of a design process blog post in the project in which I wrote a very detailed account of how I ended up with the final poster system.

Check out the Design Blog

Shop | Free Shipping on Everything!

Now that my online shop has been open for ~4 months (a virtual hug to everyone who's bought a print and/or pen plot!) I've learned more about how things work behind the scenes. A bonus for you is that I'm now offering free shipping on everything! This includes a track trace for the data visualization prints. For the pen plots, that includes standard shipping, and you can upgrade to a tracking code for a small amount (^▽^)

Since May, I added 5 new prints for the "Figures in the Sky" series and a new pen plot inspired by Lissajous curves.

PS | Only 2 more left of the blue Harmonograph #17176 pen plot from the image above before it's sold out!

Satellite Surge | Scientific American

For the May issue of Scientific American, I created a visualization showing the rise and recent surge in the number of satellites that orbit Earth. The request was to make a visual that wouldn’t be a more typical “visual that shows the satellites as dots around the Earth” and should instead be something more visually bold. I ended up creating a "home-cooked" hybrid between a streamgraph and bump chart to reveal the enormous rise in tiny satellites over the past few years.

See More About the Visual

PS | I recently finished another satellite-related visual for an upcoming issue of Scientific American (full spread this time!) that I'll share in my next newsletter. I just can't get enough of working on these space-related visuals!

Blogs | Creation of the Hubble Visuals

The Sony Music blog isn't the only design process blog I've written recently. In the last newsletter, I shared the data visualizations I made for Physics Today to celebrate the Hubble Space Telescope's 30th birthday.

You can read a very detail-oriented blog about creating and designing the main poster with all of Hubble's ±500,000 scientific observations. And another shorter design blog about the visual that explores the main targets that Hubble has observed.

Interview | Explore Explain

Andy Kirk interviewed me for his new Explore Explain series, where we talked in-depth about the entire process of creating the alis visualization. From working with the client, considering brand guidelines, the very roundabout design process, implementing interactivity, and more. 

Check out the Video or Audio Conversation

See you again in a few months with a new update!

Brand new online shop!!!

Finally! I've finally gotten around to setting up an online shop! I've been wanting to expand my work into the real world for a long time. To create high-quality prints of some of my favorite data visualizations and be able to sell these in my own shop.

Behind the scenes, I've been making A3 / A4 print versions of Marble Butterflies, Hubble's 30-year legacy, The Words in the Lord of the Rings, Star maps, and more. Right now, you can choose from 19 different prints, some of which are limited editions. These are printed on-demand, with archival-quality ink and paper (which is gorgeous, I've had test prints of each poster series sent to myself).

I hope you'll like the current collection. And if there's a project of mine not yet up there that you'd be interested in seeing as a print, let me know (via email or on Twitter)! (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:・ﾟ✧

Check out the Shop!

Stepping into the world of Pen Plotting

If you've been following my Twitter or Instagram accounts, you may have noticed that I've been working on something else besides data visualizations since the start of April; pen plotting! I finally bought an AxiDraw V3/A3, and I've been having tons of fun ever since. I'm still in my spirograph/harmonograph/guilloche phase, but I'll just let my curiosity guide me on what to work on next.

I've been getting such lovely reactions to the shared results that I've put several of the plots in my online store. These are all limited editions (each out of 10) because I want to keep things diverse for me as well, seeing as I'll be sitting next to the machine that generally takes 1-2 hours to draw out each plot ^.~

Hubble's 30-year Legacy | Physics Today

One of my proudest data visualizations ever! In celebration of the Hubble Space Telescope’s 30-year anniversary in April 2020, I created two static visualizations for Physics Today to be used in their series of articles on Hubble’s history. The main visual became a full poster that revealed over 550,000 observations on a sky map while highlighting some of the most famous observations and photos.

See the First Article

The second visual was created as a companion piece outlining the different target classifications of Hubble’s observations. From supernovae to gravitational lensing, interacting galaxies, and exoplanets, outer space is full of the most amazing objects, and Hubble has watched some of the most amazing ones!

See the Second Article

Highly Hazardous Pesticides | Unearthed

Unearthed, the journalistic arm of Greenpeace, has done a large-scale investigation together with Public Eye, an NGO from Switzerland, on the sales of hazardous pesticides by the CropLife companies. I created several eye-catching visuals to accompany the different articles that each team has written about the findings from the investigation.

See All the Visuals

Alone in a Crowded Milky Way | Scientific American

For Scientific American, I created a visual for the excellent article “Alone in a Crowded Milky Way.” Ever heard of the Fermi Paradox? The apparent contradiction between the lack of evidence of alien civilizations and the generally high estimates for their probability to exist. Well, researchers have been tackling this concept for decades, and the original article goes into the findings of one of the latest simulations.
The visual was created as a static piece for the printed magazine. However, because I create all my visuals through code, it wasn't a far stretch to also make a video that "flies through" the cube of (alien) systems, giving you a new perspective on the simulation. Plus I also added several more up-close shots. You can see the new content on my portfolio page on the project.

See More from the Full Article

Learn my Personal Tips for Better DataViz

Just a small reminder that in these times when we all need to learn digitally, together with Skillshare I've created a 1-hour course in which I share my personal tips and best practices on taking a data visualization beyond the default. You can take my Customizing Charts for Beauty & Impact course for free through the link below with a 2-month Skillshare trial!

Check out the Course on Skillshare

Podcast | Being Freelance

I had a really great time talking to Steve Folland from the Being Freelance podcast! He asked some really in-depth questions about how I got into, and go about freelancing. Plus, I got to share two rather odd facts about myself in the final "2-truths-1-lie" section near the end. I hope you'll enjoy listening to it!

Listen to the Podcast

See you again in a few months with a new update!

Alone in a Crowded Milky Way | Scientific American

For the January edition of Scientific American, I created the visual for the excellent article “Alone in a Crowded Milky Way.” Ever heard of the Fermi Paradox? The apparent contradiction between the lack of evidence of alien civilizations and the generally high estimates for their probability to exist. Researchers have been tackling this concept for decades, and this article goes into the findings of one of the latest simulations. Really, the article is an awesome (and accessible) read. I highly recommend it!

Read the Scientific American Article

Attitudinal Dimensions of American Consumers | Kantar

I created two very different data visualizations for Kantar Consulting using their MotiveMix dataset. One is a large poster (in two color options; black and white) meant for their new office and an animation to be viewed online. MotiveMix looks at American consumers along 12 "attitudinal dimensions" such as Tech Disposition, Environmentalism, Cultural Connection, and more to better understand what is important to consumers in the counties across the US. I really love creating static visuals and posters since I know 100% sure how the final image is going to look on every screen and browser ^.~

See More Images and Close-Ups

Exploring a Product Portfolio | Janssen

Another poster! Created in 2017, and finally able to share it. This giant, meant-to-be-A0 poster provides an overview of the ingredients within the Janssen product portfolio and the extent to which those ingredients are observed across a network of healthcare data that is available throughout the Johnson & Johnson enterprise. Revealing insights such as seasonality in use and parts of the world where a certain ingredient is used more often.

See More Images

Preferential Polling Results | Swayable

I was finally able to work with Voronoi Treemaps! I've wanted to create one for years, but it was first technically impossible for me, and then came along with the amazing d3-voronoi-map plugin! I'm glad my client, Swayable, agreed it would work well with their dataset about how people would vote for the upcoming US presidential elections. This isn’t just about a person’s “top choice,” but instead asks to rank all the candidates. It’s called instant-runoff voting (and has many other names too). The interactive visual shows how the results evolve as Swayable does new surveys, and you can see it in action on their blog.

See More Images and the Other Visuals

Learn my personal tips for better DataViz

Also made resolutions to do and learn new things in this new decade? Is getting better at data visualization one of those perhaps? In that case, hopefully, I can help! Together with Skillshare, I've created a 1-hour course in which I share my personal tips and best practices on taking data visualization beyond the default. You can take my Customizing Charts for Beauty & Impact course for free through the link below with a 2-month Skillshare trial!

Check Out the Course on Skillshare!

Interview | net magazine

I’m very happy to be featured in the current (Feb 2020) issue of net magazine! They asked me very pointed questions and wanted to know the craziest other small bits, from my important dates to favorite artists, things that make my life worthwhile. I even divulged the thing that I'm currently crazy about (personally) but haven’t yet shared online... I don't have the issue yet myself to provide a photo, but I believe I’m on page 48 for those that do have the magazine ^_^

See you again in a few months with a new update!

Imaging the entire Earth, every day | Planet

Planet’s goal of imaging the entirety of the Earth every day became achievable with the unprecedented fleet of small satellites called “doves.” This main visualization I created for them showcases one day in the life of these satellites and the astounding 600,000 images captured on that day. Following the main “flocks” of satellites as white spheres circling the Earth several times a day, and seeing exactly when and where each photo was taken. A second section of the story focuses on the different fleets that Planet has in orbit and their imaging resolutions.

Check out the Project

Visualizing Trackers | New York Times

The New York Times had done fascinating research on the insane number of digital trackers that you gather when you browse the web, well, anywhere. This resulted in a large dataset of trackers and metadata about what these trackers gathered and from which domain / company they originated. The New York Times reached out to me to help turn this large dataset into an eye-catching and illustrative visualization that would go in both the printed edition and online, revealing just how much information is being gathered on on the web that most of us never know or ever see.

Read the Full Article

Voting | Information is Beautiful Awards

I'm exceptionally happy that my "Why do cats and dogs...?" collaboration together with Google News Lab, was chosen for the "Arts, Entertainment & Culture" shortlist of the 2019 Information is Beautiful Awards. Since the winners are decided by public vote (together with expert judges), I would be very honored, grateful, and extremely happy if you would vote for it if you like the project! (it only takes 10 seconds •‿~)

Vote for “Why do Cats and Dogs…?”

EU deportation flights | Lighthouse Reports

Lighthouse reports was working together with news organizations across Europe to reveal that a massive deportation machine, Frontex, has grown up in Europe in the last decade. Through “Freedom of Information” requests they had gotten information about each Frontex flight that sent deportees back home. They asked me to create an animation that would reveal the enormous growth of these deportation flights in the last few years and reveal the surge in budgets that Frontex now gets to work with, matching the political appetite for forced returns.

See the Full Animation

New Talk | Visualizing Connections

I've recently created a new talk that goes into some of the more recent projects that I've made. Revealing the (sometimes ugly) truth behind the design process. The common thread they all share; they all tell a story about connections but in completely different ways. From a royal family tree to those existing between UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage to connections drawn in the night skies and more. All types of connections are unique, and revealing the intricacies that lie within them requires a creative, iterative, and custom approach. 

Watch the talk on Vimeo

Interview | Intricate & Visually Exciting

I recently did an interview with Noëlle and Jason from the Data Visualization Society for its Nightingale publication. Discussing the design of my "Why do cats & dogs...?" project, going into color, my work process, telling complex stories, and more.

Read the Full Interview

See you again in a few months with a new update!

Why do cats and dogs ...? | Google News Lab

I've had the pleasure of working with Simon Rogers and Alberto Cairo from Google again to create an extensive dataviz-driven story. The topic this time? Our pets! What do people most search for to understand cats and dogs better?
You can explore the most popular questions asked on Google that start with “Why do cats / why does my cat / why are cats” and some more variations, plus the same for dogs. What “strange” behavior is asked so often that it appears actually to be quite normal. What’s up with cats and cucumbers, while dogs apparently have a fascination with eating poop?! The story takes you through the most interesting and funny insights found in the data through several whimsical and interactive visuals.

Check out the Project!

In case you’re interested, I also wrote a humongous blog about the design process that went into creating “Why do cats and dogs ...?”, the biggest project I've ever worked on.

Read the Full Blog

Shareholder Report | Adyen

Adyen, a payment service provider, wanted to feature more than just text and tables in their second-ever shareholder letter & annual report. Looking at what data might be interesting to visualize, I eventually turned several tables from the reports into 4 more extensive visuals about the income statement, costs, regional and FTE growth.

See the Final Visuals

Blog | Dataviz on Mobile vs. Desktop

I've recently written an extensive blog about Techniques for Data Visualization on both Mobile & Desktop. From doing nothing all the way to creating a different chart for mobile and desktop. I'm sharing and explaining these and many more examples in the blog. Hopefully, they can act as an inspiration for how you might tackle your own dataset and visual.

Read the Blog

Noon it’s Not | Scientific American

For the March 2019 issue of Scientific American, I created the Graphic Science page. From pitching the initial idea to the data gathering, preparation, visualization, and writing the text (ofc with the great assistance of the SciAm team!). The article shows that the Sun is not at its highest point when our clock strikes noon in many locations around the world, with the difference reaching up to 3+ hours in Western Alaska and China on the longest day of the year, June 21st.

See the Graphic Science Page

Visualizing task dependencies | alis

My client, alis_, was looking for a way to visualize the services running on their custom operating system; to reveal if the OS was running well and which tasks were failing, but also to show the dependencies of services having created new services. The final visual is meant for both management and marketing purposes and thus had to be effective, still look good, and be on brand. After an extensive design phase to investigate what forms revealed the insights, I developed a custom interactive visual called a “depth circle” as a fully working prototype, which they incorporated into their systems.

See the Interactive Visual

Dataviz Course | Skillshare

Together with Skillshare, I've created a 1-hour course in which I share my tips and best practices on taking data visualization beyond the default. You can take my Customizing Charts for Beauty & Impact course for free through the link below with a 2-month Skillshare trial!

Check Out the Course!

I hope you'll have a lovely summer & see you again in a few months with a new update!

Dive into your Cultural Heritage | UNESCO

I've been honored to work with UNESCO to visualize the connections between our Intangible Cultural Heritage. Currently, about 500 cultural elements are inscribed on UNESCO’s list. All of these have been extensively “tagged” with concepts such as Family, Trees, Dance, and more by UNESCO’s experts. The main visual lets you explore and discover how our cultural elements are connected through these concepts.

And that’s not all; I got the opportunity to create three more visuals, each having its own focus. One shows the connections to nature and ecosystems specifically, another which cultural elements are under threat, and the final one reveals the domains of which the elements are a part. All visuals are highly interactive, you can often zoom, click, hover, and move it all around, and I hope you'll enjoy exploring them all! 

Discover All the Visuals

Dataviz Course | Skillshare

I've been super happy to work with Skillshare to create an online course where I share my tips to take your dataviz beyond the default. A quick 1-hour course that I hope will teach you many different techniques.

You can take my Customizing Charts for Beauty & Impact course through the link below with a 2-month Skillshare trial.

Check Out the Course

Revealing Trends | ScenarioDNA

ScenarioDNA has a (patented) data-driven method that addresses the study of people and their ideologies over time; it’s quite fascinating! 
I build an interactive visual prototype to help scenarioDNA’s clients understand the data and see upcoming & established trends in their respective sectors.

Explore the Demo

Gold at the IIB Awards!

On December 4th, the extensive dataviz-driven story that I helped to create together with Shirley Wu and the Guardian US team about how homeless people are being bussed around the US was honored with the Gold award in Politics & Global at the 2018 Information is Beautiful Awards! Ecstatic still (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:・ﾟ✧

See More Winners

Goodbye 98.6° | Scientific American

(or 37° Celsius for basically all non-Americans ^.~ )

I had no idea! But it's actually not true that 98.6° F is the "normal" body temperature. New crowd-sourced data, plus older lab research, shows that our body's temperature fluctuates throughout the day, is different for men and women, and also depends on the location of measurement. And it's basically always lower than 98.6 degrees. You can see the visual I made for the Scientific American in full on the Graphic Science page of the December issue.

Have an amazing 2019 & see you again in a few months with a new update!

Figures in the Stars | Personal Project

An interactive visual story that looks into how current & past cultures across the World have seen their myths in the stars. Focusing on several of the brightest and most famous stars & constellations. Are there certain "shapes" that cultures everywhere have recognized? Hopefully, you'll also be able to recognize a few new constellations after reading this!

This is the final data sketches month that I still had to finish! With the topic of Myths & Legends, it took me a long time to figure out the exact angle I wanted to investigate. But once I finally thought of constellations, I knew it was the perfect final theme. Combining my background & interest in Astronomy and my passion for data visualization

See the Article

A Year in Flights | Transavia

A data art piece created for Transavia, a Dutch airline, that conveys the intricacies of a year’s worth of their flights. Each flight is turned into an abstract shape whose appearance is completely determined by its data.

See the Project

New Website! | Visual Cinnamon

After 2 months of work, I was exceptionally happy to reveal my new site. Created from the ground up, this gives me much more freedom in the design & options for adding interactive dataviz. I hope you'll like it!

See the New Site!

Upcoming excitement!

I haven’t posted about as many new projects as I would’ve liked (partly due to several internal client projects). However! Another reason is that I’ve been working on two rather big projects. A small teaser I can give is that one project is for UNESCO, where we’ve dubbed the resulting visual “The Constellation” and where we’re adding several more options & layers before it’s revealed in December.

And finally, at the end of June, I went to New York to record a ±1-2 hour data visualization course with Skillshare that is scheduled to come out in the next couple of months. Super excited about this, and I hope to be able to share more soon!

See you again in a few months with another update!

Now that 2017 is almost at an end (for some, 2018 might've already started!) I wanted to share some of the data visualization projects I've worked on over the past few months. Perhaps these can help you start the new year with some inspiration. Especially having worked together with the Guardian on visualizing the story about how homeless people are being bussed around the US was very special. But I’ve also gone into Cardcaptor Sakura, the Top 2000 best songs, exoplanets and the Freedom of Expression.

Bussed out | The Guardian

The biggest and most intense data visualization project I’ve ever worked on (together with the wonderful Shirley Wu). A scrollytelling-style US map, animated journey arcs, and more visualizations support the story.

This intricate article investigates how US cities give thousands of homeless people one-way bus tickets out of town each year. Discover what happens at the journey’s end...

Read the Full Story

And Ode to Cardcaptor Sakura | Personal

CCS is one of the most beautiful & adorable mangas ever created. For Data Sketches’ June month, this project is my ode to the wonderful series. Discover its characters, relations, cover art, and more in this extensive & interactive piece.

See the Project

Freedom of Expression | Article 19

I had the pleasure of working together with ARTICLE 19, a human rights organization. Turning their data about the freedom of expression across the world into an artful, explorable visualization.

See More about the Project

Let The Music Play | Personal Project

My yearly December project: Visualizing the Top 2000 (the best songs ever made) and how the songs are distributed according to their year of release. Investigate how artists perform, the "best" years, and more in this year's "vinyl" theme.

Discover the Songs

Meet the Neighbours | Scientific American

And finally, in the December issue of the Scientific American, you can find a visualization in "Graphic Science" of our nearest stars and which of those have planets. It was wonderful to be able to combine my background in Astronomy with my passion for the visualization of data!

Check out the Visual

Have a wonderful 2018, and see you again in a few months with another update!