slide:ology

CHAPTER 3

43

Creating Diagrams

When I was little, I would sit on the floor for hours

sorting and arranging objects, textures, and layers

in a way that told a story.

44

Classifying Diagrams

At my firm, we use sketchbooks to generate many ideas

around a concept. I collected the sketchbooks of all the

employees and created iconic representations of the

most common diagrams. I cut these thousands of dia-

grams into little cards and sat on the floor for hours and

sorted them. I felt like a little kid again.

After a long day hunched over the diagrams, a pattern

and classification began to emerge. There were distinct

differences in the diagrams and how they would be

used to show relationships in information for profes-

sional communication.

A diagram is a good way to explain how parts of a

whole interact. It’s nearly impossible to communicate

today without using shapes to symbolize various types

of relationships and their interactions.

Relationships, patterns,

and classifications of

the diagrams emerged

from the sketches.

Creating Diagrams 45

Structure

Matrices

Trees

Layers

Pictorial

Direction

Location

Reveal

Process

Influence

0

Display Data

Comparison

Trend

Distribution

Cluster

Overlapping

Closure