Scientific Figure Design
v2.0
Simon Andrews, Anne Segonds-Pichon, Boo Virk
simon.andrews@babraham.ac.uk
anne.segonds-pichon@babraham.ac.uk
bhupinder.virk@babraham.ac.uk
What this course covers…
• Theory of data visualisation
– Why do some figures work better than others?
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Ethics of data representation
Elements of graphic design
Editing bitmap images in GIMP
Vector editing and compositing in Inkscape
Journal submissions
What this course doesn’t cover…
• How to draw graphs in specific programs
– R Introduction
– Statistics with R
– Statistics with GraphPad
• Network representations
• Spatial data representations
Timetable
• Morning
– Introduction
– Data Visualisation
Theory
• Coffee
– Data Representation
Practical
– Ethics talk
• Afternoon
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Design theory talk
Ethics practical
GIMP Tutorial
GIMP Practical
• Coffee
– Inkscape Tutorial
– Inkscape Practical
– Final practical
Data Visualisation Process
Collect Raw Data
Process and Filter
Data
Clean Dataset
Exploratory
Analysis
Generate
Conclusion
Types of figure
• Exploration
– Understanding your data
• Reference
– No specific point to make, a resource
• Illustration
– A way to present the data to support a specific
conclusion
Exploratory visualisation
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Understand your data
Multiple ways to present and summarise
Crude representations
Interactive
Not intended for final publication
– Can be adapted for publication
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Reference visualisation
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Using your data as a resource
Allows users to look up data of interest
Tabular / Configurable
Interactive
Illustrative visualisation
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Intended to convey a specific point
Carefully chosen subset of data
Optimised presentation
Good design
• Used for figures in papers
What makes a good figure?
• Has a clear message
– Helps to tell a story
– Adds to the text, and links to it
• Is focussed
– Don’t confuse one message with another
• Is easy to interpret correctly
– Good data visualisation
– Good design
• Is an honest and true reflection of the data