Capstone — Week 13
A Physical Visualization Exploration
With the final presentation fast approaching and week 13 wrapping up, I am rounding the final stretch. We received the news that our class will be presenting our capstones in a theater on stage to an audience of our faculty, classmates, community, friends and family. Big GULP! The pressure is on! And if chosen, our works will be showcased in a show following in the afternoon. Double GULP!
With “Week 12” getting me to a place I had been looking to reach through the process, a place where I finally feel I am arriving where I need to be, the last week mostly was spent planning the final physical visualization prototypes. And I continued to share my progress and get feedback to further refine the work.
So, the planning in “Week 13" included digitally mapping the visualizations in InDesign and Illustrator, and refining colors and visualization language for the physical construction. Along with mapping, I have been digitally designing some of the shapes with the help of https://www.templatemaker.nl/ and augmenting them as needed, while preparing the layouts in Cricut Design Space for cutting most of the shapes with the Cricut Maker.
I continue to play with the heatmap layout, while also mapping monthly small multiples. The latter is leading towards a possible design kit and/or instructional so others can create their own physical mapping.
While these mappings are meant to help me construct and not part of the final piece, I have included them to help share my visual process. Below I played with comparing each January across five years. While it was interesting to see them together, I feel that comparison chronologically month-to-month may provide more meaningful insight.
In this mapping, each color tile represents a yoga practice that took place on the mat. Each shade of color from light to dark represents the varied levels and types of yoga practiced. The blue corner depending on position represents the time of day the practice took place. And in the most current January 2022, intentions for practice have been written daily. The one thing not apparent in the digital mappings is the duration which will be the depth of the tile. And I may include symbols/shapes for yoga teachers as I have done in the initial heatmap prototype shared in earlier postings.
Planning, sketching, input and designing are such a large part of the process. The physical construction though quite a time-consuming part is just a fraction of the whole.
For the prototype, I continue to build using paper as the main material and at what I consider a miniature scale compared to what I envisioned as a final piece beyond the prototype. Time, space and material cost are constraints at this point. While I am not building the large-scale wall piece I would prefer, the miniatures still take up space and hopefully will have a visual impact of their own. And I hope the prototype construction will be aesthetically pleasing as well.
So for now, I continue to map and play with the physical construction as the final builds start to take shape.
