There’s a great thread on the AE List (www.media-motion.tv) about designing data graphics. Some really great links came up (thanks in particular to Rich Young). In truth, I love graphics derived from data. I think it can be truly beautiful to see how some data sets emerge visually. Our Data Animator 1.0 is just a baby step towards a more full featured set of plugins for really playing with data. Hope to do more with it soon. Some links…
There is the master of infographics, Edward Tufte:
http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/
If you do anything related to designing information graphics, his three books are must reads. They contain some beautiful examples of charts and graphs. If you didn’t think infographics could be beautiful you have not seen these books. One of my regrets with Data Animator 1.0 was that we couldn’t incorporate more of his ideas.
A great site for infographics:
Data Visualization: Modern Approaches has a link to the Hans Rosling TED Talk and more:
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/08/02/data-visualization-modern-approaches/
From Photoshop product manager John Nack:
http://blogs.adobe.com/jnack/2007/04/adventures_in_i.html
cheers, Jim