Independent Project Look Back

Looking at my written brief I feel that I have written a brief that guides the student because I have guided them to look at Aaron Koblins ‘Flight Patterns’ as a starting point. By doing this I feel that this will plant an idea in their head of how transport data is visualized. Also looking at the brief I have written I have looked at past briefs and copied and modified some of the features of aims, learning outcomes and evidence of study. By doing this it provides the brief with a lot more guidance and shows what should be done for the project.

Looking at my research I feel that I have done the right research because I found out how flight patterns was made. Also by looking at how other transport visualisations have been made I could make mine different and not look like the rest of them and therefore make mine unique. I feel by finding my data the way I did I got all the data that I needed because I started by going to Seaford and Lewes train station and asking for the leaflets of the different route and by doing this there was only 15 out of 33 route leaflets. Therefore by finding the digital versions I have a copy that I can print time and time again and draw over should I find repeats and merging routes in the timetables.

Looking back on my working methods I feel that it all went well because I feel that be researching into how flight patterns was made I could combine my skills in different software to create one piece. But first by analysing the data and editing the map to the stations that are stopped at I had a better understanding of what was needed to be used for the animation. Then by finding out that processing was used to create the data points in flight patterns gave me the idea of taking the edited map into processing and use my knowledge of processing to plot the stations of the map. Then by taking the end result of this into Photoshop and creating the track outline then gave me guidance when it cone to animating the trains in after effects. Therefore looking back on my whole project I feel that I used all the right methods to create my end result that I wanted to.

Finally looking at the final outcome of my project I am happy with it and I feel that I have done what I set out to do. I feel that if I had only shown the map animation the viewer might not make as much of an impact as of showing the map animation and the trains only animation. This is because with the train only animation you have less to visually analyse and it shows how many trains that are running at the given time. Also I feel that by adding the banner bar adds more character to what I am trying to portray because it keeps the animation along the line of the southern rail company by using their company colours. Also I have learned more about after effects because I have found out about the use of expression to create animations of digits.

Compleated Animation

This is my completed animation of the train times, where i have combined six hours of train schedules into a minuet.

Class Crit

After showing the normal passe animation and speed up animation at class crit I got these comment...

• Normal passed one is two long
• its better to use the fast one
• make the outline map solid
• all together very interesting
• add a clock in the corner

Therefor i am going to take in these comments and make changes

Before Class Crit

Due to personal issues i have a extension but i still need to show work at the class crit. So with a number of routes still left to animate i have created an export because enough has been animated for class mates and teaching staff to see what i have created.

Without Track

Considering i am a third of a way through the routes i need to animate i wondered what the animation looks like with no map behind it and i think that it looks interesting. This is because i was inspired by Aaron Koblin and Flight patterns and i think that this is interesting because viewing my animation like this you dont know what the route is so it adds some mystery to the animation,

Creating a Clock

After getting to a point with my animation and deciding that it is symbolizing six hours i have realized that I have not got a clock to show this so i need to find out how to create a animated clock in after effects.

After researching how to do this i found a tutorial with some code here...

Universal Up/Down After Effects Clock

with in this tutorial it shows this variable code

rate = -2;
clockStart = 3604.999;

function padZero(n){
if (n < 10) return "0" + n else return "" + n
}

clockTime = clockStart + rate*(time - inPoint);

if (clockTime < 0){
sign = "-"; clockTime = -clockTime;
}else{
sign = "";
}

t = Math.floor(clockTime);
hr = Math.floor(t/3600);
min = Math.floor((t%3600)/60);
sec = Math.floor(t%60);
ms = clockTime.toFixed(3).substr(-3);
sign + padZero(hr) + ":" + padZero(min) + ":" + padZero(sec) + "." + ms

 and the code works by this analysis

Animating The Wrong Way

Looking back on how i have been animating the routes (which has been one route at at time) i realize that this is taking a long time. So i now plan to go through all the routes and animating the trains once so when it come to doing the whole time table i already have the route animated and all i have to do is adjust the timing of the animated train.

Duplicate Routes

As i have been animating the routes I have realised that even though there are thirty three routes there are a few routes that are within each other, so this shows that there may be loads of routes but there are routes that merge and cross over with each other. Therefore the animation has not have as much as i thought there was.

Time Period To Animate

After spending a week animating train routes I have realised that looking at the time I have to compleate the project i have decided to animate a time period of six hours because by animating twelve hours it would take too long to animate a thirty three routes.

Create An Outline

After showing the PSD of the stations that I plotted in processing processing i thought that it would be best that i create an outline as a guide for when i start animating the model trains, this will be so i have a guideline to keep in

Class Presentation Of Work So Far

After returning to class and presenting my ideas to the class i showed them what point i had got to with my idea. I got good feedback from the class but when i showed my map it was suggested that i keep the outline of the original map so people have something to follow. Therefore i am going to look at the way i have created the map and modify it.

Convert Processing to PSD

After plotting the map in processing I took a still of the processing map and then opened it up in Photoshop and then plotted it again because i have come up with the idea that the stations could appear as the trains go over them the first time.

Design the Train

With my idea being about trains and animation i thought that it would be best to design a small figure to animate instead of dots. Therefore this keeps my animation a long the idea of being based on a train schedule.

Map Plotten In Processing

After completing the edited map I took it into processing and plotted the stations using processing. Now I have completed the map i am going to look at it and see if there is any diffrent ways that i can animate it.

Edited Map

After going through the schedules i found out that there was a number of stations and routes that needed to be taken out. Therefore this is the final outcome map that i need to modify and animate over the top...

Found My Data

After trying to collect all the leaflets of the Southern Rail i resorted to the internet and i have found that all the leaflets are available as pdf's to download. My task now is to go through all of these schedules and compare the stations that they stop at to the map, because after looking at the official map not all the stations on there are owned/run by Southern Rail but are only drop off stations. Therefore once i know the stations that are on the schedule i can remove the ones that are not.

Data Art on BBC Backstage

Search Web

When using the BBC website and you want to find something quick normally you use the search tool similar to google which when you search it gives you a list of results on a page. But with SearchWeb it lets you look for content on the BBC website, by searching terms it then generates a information tree of your searched term containing links to web pages with the BBC homepage at its centre.

By taking the data that is the information you have searched for and presenting it in the form of a tree you can quickly see the connections with the different areas of the BBC that your search has covered. Using a tree structure makes it easier to navigate much easier to follow topics, once again colour is used as a way of showing difference

Public Transport Visualization of North West England

Public Transport Journeys in the North West of England from ItoWorld on Vimeo.

This visualization is showing the public transport in the north west of England. The data was taken from National Public Transport Data Repository (NPTDR), if you look closely at the map you will see that Liverpool is on the left and Manchester right. By looking at the colour coding on the map and the way that it is layed out, I am analysing that the blue are travel on the roads due to the fact that they are much denser on the map. Also that the whites are trains because they are moving at a much faster speed, there is a less ratio of blue to white and that the whites are animated on a fixed path.

Trafic Visulisation

This visualization is the use of data from Waze users (a mobile application providing free turn-by-turn navigation based on the live conditions of the other Waze users) combined with passive traffic data. The pulsating circles are alerts from users reporting hazards, traffic jams, highway patrol, and communicating with one another. While the lines are trips made by Waze users, the way that they work is when they first appear in white the trip is starting, then once the trip has been completed they fade to gray.

This shows that by using a length of time can be a good way to show that the data has changed. Also with this example it shows that colour is a way of showing different categories that you may have within your data. I will take this analysis and see if i can apply it to my idea in some way.

My Plan

Now i have researched how flight patterns was made I have a plan to create my idea.

1. take a image of the map into processing
2. plot the points of the train stations over the map
3. take this into photoshop for some further editing
4. take into after effects
   
5. animate the schedules over the map

What I need to do now is collect all the data that i need and analyse it to see if there is any think that i need to take into consideration for my animation.