Timelines Revisited: A Design Space and Considerations for Expressive Storytelling

Abstract

There are many ways to visualize event sequences as timelines. In a storytelling context where the intent is to convey multiple narrative points, a richer set of timeline designs may be more appropriate than the narrow range that has been used for exploratory data analysis by the research community. Informed by a survey of 263 timelines, we present a design space for storytelling with timelines that balances expressiveness and effectiveness, identifying 14 design choices characterized by three dimensions: representation, scale, and layout. Twenty combinations of these choices are viable timeline designs that can be matched to different narrative points, while smooth animated transitions between narrative points allow for the presentation of a cohesive story, an important aspect of both interactive storytelling and data videos. We further validate this design space by realizing the full set of viable timeline designs and transitions in a proof-of-concept sandbox implementation that we used to produce seven example timeline stories. Ultimately, this work is intended to inform and inspire the design of future tools for storytelling with timelines.

Multiple Views: different meanings and collocated words

“…The former includes concepts such as planning, thinking, sketching and outlining the idea (e.g., [RHR16, RHR17]), whereas the latter addresses storytelling, presentation, delivery, interpretation or understanding of the underpinning ideas (e.g. [RRJH18,WBE∗06, SH10, BLB∗17]). Both categories represent fast‐developing areas in visualisation; with researchers investigating new ways to better design a visualisation, and others investigating how best to tell stories about their data.…”

“…They are talking about their opinion. Similar concepts are explored within the storytelling and narrative visualisation styles (e.g., [BLB∗17]). Indeed, in our collaborative research with archaeologists [KRW∗14], the archaeologists often talk about minority groups, or ways to understand the views of historic people.…”

CV3: Visual Exploration, Assessment, and Comparison of CVs

“…Lifelines provide a general visualization environment primarily focused on multiple personal histories. A comprehensive survey and analysis of the design space of timeline visualization techniques is available from Brehmer et al [BLB∗17]. One of the main drawbacks of using timelines in non‐interactive (static) environments is that only a small subset of the event's information can be displayed ‐ we can see the start and end date, along with the title of an event but the description, location, the type of event, and other metadata are not visible.…”

Once upon a Spacetime: Visual Storytelling in Cognitive and Geotemporal Information Spaces

“…"Time presents specific challenges for the representation of data because time is a complex and highly abstract concept" [26] (p. 203). One of the most frequently used solutions is to map time to a spatial (i.e., linear or sequential) dimension of the pictorial space, which often results in timelines [27][28][29][30], or also in linearly juxtaposed representations of sequential art [31][32][33].…”

“…Various forms of morphing visually translate from one spatialization principle to another and, thus, help to build up a coherent representation of both views [30]. By changing layouts incrementally-as opposed to abrupt changes or hard cuts between views-the spatial rearrangement of the story-relevant elements into new constellations can be perceptually traced.…”