Battle of Britain [2]

Battle of Britain – 70 years on

The battle in graphic form, in last weekend's Sunday Telegraph's Battle of Britain eight page supplement, which I hope to post this week

So rare these days to work on projects, time to think, time to develop

Over a week or two, Stefan Bayley and Ciaran Hughes played a blinder with visualising the content, and Fiona Mattias as always, steered the supplement, meticulously

My favorite part?

The daily number of aircraft lost from July 10 to the end of September

This is a lot of aircraft

And in the sky, over the southern coasts of England and initially across the deep channel

Can you imagine witnessing a dog-fight in clear summer skies?

I was walking the dogs this morning, and a Messerschmitt Me 109e idled above the Chiltern Valley, where I live

Great engines roaring

Imagine multiplying this by at least 100, and imagine the sounds of break-neck speed Me 109e and the British Spitfire – aircraft and each pilot with two aims – to kill and to survive

Is it impossible to "imagine you are there" with infographics? Whether we produce a more data/information driven, with illustration, or more decorative work with the added bonus of a annotated map – can our reader/viewer imagine themselves in the picture?

Maybe as children they can, adults maybe not

But the power off illustration goes along way in evoking these emotions

Although the infographic industry has grown and developed great analysts, visual reporters and chart divas, let us not forget the power of illustration

We contacted well known manufacturer of air-fix kits, and fortunately managed to manipulate a great image, to edit and show what we thought would benefit the page

Does it matter from where the visuals come?

No!

Use what you can find

Make phone calls, and send emails

Show the story

World Cup Goals

World Cup Goals – but don't make the news

The goal infographic should have made ALL the print editions of this Sunday's Telegraph

Steven Gerrard's 4th minute goal would have given us plenty of time to produce the goods for the first edition

Fine.

Stefan Bayley and Ciaran Hughes rolled up their sleeves edited the text and imagery. Celebration pics and the glorious annotated England goal ready to rock

And then butter fingers buggers it up. The news changed

Disaster

No celebrations

The infographic did not make it through all editions, only first

Swing low swingometer

Swing low swingometer for the General Election

I forgot to mention this while fighting fires and responding to the governments call of the election

Although cliched, this was an excellent graphic by Stefan Bayley at the Telegraph

It clearly shows what David Cameron and the Conservatives need to do in their uphill task of winning an increasingly-unlikely election victory

Great stuff

[Winter Olympics] BOBSLEIGH infographic

Winter Olympics: Bobsleigh infographic

The first in a series of graphics to be published in the Daily and Sunday Telegraph

Researched and produced by Stefan Bayley, it shows course, the sled and the all important start

Amazingly, as you can see in the example, 'that prior racing shoes, which have small spikes on the soles, wire brushes were used to aid grip on the ice...'

The last Aztec

A great pullout section in today's Sunday Telegraph

And a great infographic detailing the fall of the Aztecs

Stefan Bayley and Ciaran Hughes have produced an interesting account of the Aztec empire, and the what and the how's

As we say, god is in the detail

And this work has mucho

I like this graphic as it tells and shows a profound account of Moctezuma II, and the life and times of rule for the Aztecs under him

There is so much to learn in this graphic

Like National Geographic, and the works from El Correo, we feel a 'visual overview' narrative

Something not really seen enough in the UK press

as a friend and colleague of INNOVATION would and will say... "infographic caviar"

Operation Panther's Claw

Infographics traditional style

Like the good old days of war explanations

The comment 'opener' in the Daily Telegraph today showed the how and the whereabouts of latest offensive in Afghanistan

Is it accurate?

We think so!

The interesting debate between 'data' based in infographics and those which recreate the uncertainty of news reporting on deadline

Its great to base everything on fact, which is now why we celebrate the modern phenomenon of data sheets and spreads of statistics

But we should not forget the great pleasure the reader(s) receive from illustrating a sequence or moment in time, however long or short, of an event so far away that there is no way on earth they could never, ever visualise

That is why we do it for them. It's part of our job description

Stef Bayley built most of this for the Sunday Telegraph, unfortunately editorial real estate was gloved in the opposing corner 

Luckily for the Daily, four days later, the story was still breaking news and I decided to run Stefan's research and visual labour in all of its glory

The infographic runs with a comment piece by Allan Mallinson, ex military, which is an interesting account of 'slogans' by Government and MoD. Both very different.

Gordon Brown has not yet labelled this front in Afghanistan as a 'war'

Yet it clearly is. To label its so would mean serious investment

But without the infographic, or the visual, one would never truly appreciate the huge scale of the operation in theatre

It is however, not based on fact or data, but first-hand impression

Is it right or wrong that we can be confident in not only delivering fact and figures, but also recreate and explore means and methods that show the news?

And to take our readers to a place that neither words nor photography can chart?

Just like Peter Sullivan, John Grimwade, Duncan Mill, Jaime Serra, Charles Blow, Juan Velasco and the boys from Bilbao?

Please leave comments and debate on this subject. I feel strongly that although reporting the fact is of huge importance, surely we can also excite and add our impression, as reporters and visual commentators of the news, that our view [as an infografista] counts!

The blog

Belated scribe

Its been a while since I've had the chance to write, but times have been busy

We've been producing some nice work lately, so I thought why not show and tell

One of the picks of the crop was this, almost, full-page graphic for the Sport section, which was also placed inside the launch issue of the redesigned 'Weekly Telegraph' and now entitled 'The Telegraph' for overseas readers

Interesting that our infographics seems to have a new lease of life with the compact size, compared to the Broadsheet mothership

This example which shows how Wimbledon's Centre Court roof worked and when

The fun element of the project was interviewing the architectural firm who designed the roof

And of course nice to be able to give 'a jolly good show' as we see in the UK

Swine flu: UK press [4]

Hoovering up of explaining more?

The Sunday press hoovered up from what was left to explain from the last seven days of swine flu

The Sunday Times (a) followed the trend of showing how many cases, by country, using the circular chart method, as noticed in the Daily Telegraph, The Times, the Independent and the Guardian, while not really developing the story further.

In the Sunday Telegraph (b), Stefan Bayley and Ciaran Hughes updated the UK and global figures as shown during the week, but their is a nugget of information in the bottom right corner, as shown above, which looks at the 1918 pandemic, and how the 'case rate' peaked and troughed during the following seasons

The Independent on Sunday (c, d + e) produced a fabulous guide and infographic explainer along the base of the compact spread, of the swine flu crisis. Based upon a timeline, Cath Levett and Richard Burgess explained the past week's news in an incredibly clean and clear fashion. The infographic culminates by date, and by pandemic rating, of the death toll, and confirmed cases, by volume

Is there any more to explain?

Has any print or online platform missed anything?

Surely all has been covered, please tell me if I am wrong