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The Northeastern University Visualization Consortium (NUVis) cordially
invites you to the next talk in our invited speaker series. Following the
talk, please join us in touring the Information Design and Visualization Thesis
Exhibition <https://web.northeastern.edu/idv2017show/> in Gallery 360.


*"Timelines Revisited: Considerations for Expressive Storytelling**"*

Matthew Brehmer
Postdoctoral Researcher, Human-Computer Interaction Group, Microsoft
Research


Friday, April 28, 2017
10:30-11:30am

Snell Library 90, Northeastern University
360 Huntington Ave
Boston MA, 02115

Coffee and pastries will be served.


*Abstract*:
Timelines have been used for centuries to visually communicate stories
about sequences of events, from historical and biographical data to project
plans and medical records. Depending on how a timeline is drawn, different
types of insights and temporal characteristics can be emphasized, such as
those relating to event order, periodicity, or synchronicity. In recent
years, we have seen the emergence of interactive timeline visualization
tools for both data analysis and presentation. With regards to the latter,
I would argue that these presentation tools lack the expressivity to
communicate a range of timeline narratives, as most of them adopt the
strictly linear, chronological timeline design popularized by Joseph
Priestley in the late 18th century. In this talk, I will present a design
space for expressive storytelling with timelines, one grounded in a survey
of hundreds of timelines published over the course of history, which
includes timeline designs by Gerardus Mercator and Mark Twain, as well as
exemplary timelines drawn by contemporary infographic designers. Finally, I
will introduce Timeline Storyteller (timelinestoryteller.com), a timeline
storytelling tool that my colleagues and I have been developing, one that
realizes the expressive potential of the design space.


*About the speaker*:

Matthew Brehmer is a postdoctoral researcher with the Human-Computer
Interaction group at Microsoft Research in Redmond, Washington, where he
specializes in data visualization and its use in storytelling and
journalism. In early 2016 he completed a Computer Science PhD at the
University of British Columbia where he was a member of Tamara Munzner’s
InfoVis group. During his PhD he conducted visualization design and
evaluation projects in collaboration with Microsoft Research, the
Associated Press / Knight Foundation’s Overview Project, and Pulse Energy /
EnerNOC.  On the theoretical side, he co-developed a visualization task
typology that enables communication among researchers and promotes a
cross-pollination of visualization design across application domains. Prior
to specializing in visualization, he completed degrees in human-computer
interaction and cognitive science and worked in user experience design.

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