Jonathan Harris, whose work has previously been discussed on 1+1=3 (here and here) has released two elegant data visualisations of human emotion and desire, as expressed on blogs around the world. Like Harris's other data-vis work, these applications are supremely beautiful both in an aesthetic sense and in terms of how they succinctly and interestingly express and communicate their data-based content.
"Both pieces perform large scale blog analysis to explore human nature. We Feel Fine illustrates human emotion, while Lovelines illustrates human desire". I have to confess to exploring both for quite a while.
'We Feel Fine' searches newly posted blog entries for the phrases "I feel" and "I am feeling" and catalogues the entry according to the feeling expressed in the rest of the sentence. There are numerous ways in which to explore and sift through the visualisations of the captured data. Visually this data-vis echoes scenes of a city at night, with thousands of different coloured blobs representing a person and their particular mood. Imagine an interactive 'city-scape mood ring' (with nice type!).
'Love Lines' uses the same blog-based 'emotion recognition' approach as 'We Feel Fine' and offers "a glimpse into the hearts and minds of people blogging about their wants and needs". From the site: "Lovelines presents a stark white screen, bounded on the bottom by a slider running from “Love” to “Hate”, with a draggable heart that becomes scratched out to the point of illegibility as the heart approaches “Hate”. As the slider is pulled through Love, Like, Want, Indifference, Dislike, and Hate, words and pictures appear above to represent the chosen state of desire or despair".
Personally, I feel that words simply do not do these wonderfully poetic, poignant and highly engaging works justice. Explore We Feel Fine and Lovelines. Both projects are also collaborations with Sepandar Kamvar.
Comments