Visual Explanations: Images and Quantities, Evidence and Narrative

I have to confess to being a huge fan of Tufte though i came late to the party.This book explores the methods and values of excellence in presenting information on change: how you represent movement, actions and ideas in a way that enlightens, informs and educates.The book has excellent production values (what else did you expect) and is a a delight to explore. Tufte explains concepts and ideas in an engaging manner, pulling examples from hundreds of years of human history, from Hobbs "Leviathan", to abstract art of the 20th century. Amongst the pages are gems of insight from random places: be it descriptions fo magic tricks to descriptions of fish for those underwater! Brilliant.It's interesting to read and reflect on how this is still relevant in a digital age where images can be distorted, manipulated or created on a whim. Even more than ever, the integrity of data and information has to meet these standards to be credible and effective. Powerpoint slaves, take note!

Very good book for anyone who does presentations and reports in their work.Since it's the third book of Edward Tufte I can greatly recommend the previous 2 as well.To keep in mind, especialy with the previous books, is that Tufte has a large focus on the use of graphs and visualisations as to help with analysis and give a technically good representation of your information and data.If your looking to know more about how to sell or pitch with your presentations you might want to look for something else as a complement.Cheers/Christian

Informative review of easy and useful data display.

Great, but not as good as The Quantitative Display of Visual Information.

Maybe others would see a good use of it, to me it was nothing I was expecting it to be.

Tufte is pure genius. I own pretty much all of his work. The book is strewn with terrific stories and illustrations about the use of data and how to tell the best stories. For anyone working as an analyst or in a similar capacity which involves having to explain information to others, this book (and its companions) is truly invaluable. Don't be put off by the title, this is book you can show to your Granny and she'd be fascinated by it.

This is another book that beautifully conveys some powerful advice. I found the detailed case studies of an epidemic in old London, and the Challenger disaster were particularly persuasive and useful.Applied to management information, these arguments make the point that presentation of information can make the difference between worthless reports and illuminating reports.Since some information systems are very costly to implement, it makes sense to ensure the final presentation justifies the investment, instead of wasting it!