Students taking the University of Edinburgh’s Design with Data course, run by Dr Ted Koterwas, have been using Library datasets to learn about, and create, data visualisations.
Print to pixels
Yifei Yang, Yujun Huang, Ying Sun, and Chang Han
This project explores and visualises the Broadsides collection through ASCII art and AR technology.
Inspired by the approach to printing illustrations in broadsides using woodcuts, the group classified the broadsides into five topics and used different poster sizes to represent the number of broadsides falling into each topic. High-frequency words for the topics populate the ASCII images. By printing these posters onto wooden board, the group returned the data from the collections to physical form, to create a connection between past and present/future.
Dynamic posters led to new graphic designs. They convey more abundant graphic information, give the audience different sensory experiences, and enhance interest and interactivity […] Through [the] layered and dynamic presentation, audiences can not only ‘feel’ the evolution of the data, but also immerse themselves in the ‘story world’ behind the data.
The group also analysed the text data from the broadsides, enabling them to identify themes within and across the collection, as well as carrying out sentiment analysis of individual broadsides to identify positive or negative reportings within the items.
Using AR tools, the ASCII art posters become a dynamic way of exploring collections in greater depth and a way to learn about individual stories within the broadsides collection.
Conspiracy in the haze
Yibing Wang, Xinyi Shu, Xuan Yang and Xiaoya Xie
This project explores Scotland’s industrial revolution (1760–1840) through a prototype of an interactive detective game. The game is inspired by the Broadsides dataset, as well as historical cases such as the 1828 Burke and Hare murders. It is designed to engage young adults with storytelling and promoting critical thinking.
After analysing the data, the group determined that 30% of the collection of broadsides had a focus on crime. They found that:
- murder and theft were dominant crime types
- references to crime peaked in the 1820s
- Edinburgh and Glasgow were the locations with the largest number of references in this context
Analysis also drew out certain biases reflected in the game, which the group picked up on as problematic – all characters are male, as most victims and offenders detailed in the broadsides were men, for example.
The visual design of the game draws on historical and artistic references to enhance immersion. The group drew inspiration from narrative games like Pentiment, which emulate the aesthetics of medieval manuscripts and woodblock prints. Similarly, characters and environments were crafted to reflect the 1820s, informed by 19th-century British illustrations and photography.
Stories in Light and Sound: aesthetic explorations of nineteenth century Scotland
Kimberley Paradis, Amanda Horzyk, Gia Xu and Xinyu Zhang
This project explores the intersection of historical data, aesthetics, and interactive storytelling. Using the Broadsides dataset, the group developed an interactive collage combining elements of colour, artifacts, historical moments, and art. Through non-linear storytelling and design techniques based in the field of Computing x Aesthetics, they sought to make Scotland’s history accessible to audiences who may not usually engage with cultural heritage.
The resulting visualisation presents a 100-year timeline of 19th-century Scotland, designed as an interactive platform that users can navigate using a flashlight-like tool, which adds a tactile, exploratory element to the visualization and encourages users to actively engage with the timeline by ‘illuminating’ different historical moments. This non-linear storytelling approach allows users to discover narratives at their own pace.
The project involved:
- investigating the frequency of broadside publications over the available years. This found a period of high publication density between 1770 and 1879, where broadsides were published almost annually.
- creating sonifications of publication frequencies of the library catalogue from 1800 to 1900. The three data patterns of 1-year, 5-year and decade interval frequencies were then mapped onto a single score and assigned instruments typical of the era (for example, harpsichord, pipe organ, bassoon) and appropriate length of individual notes. The final audio file plays automatically as users explore the design; the 1-year frequency score was also aligned into a single string and incorporated in the immersive collage.
- understanding the emotional tone of 19th -century Scotland, by using the NRC Emotion Lexicon on the broadsides. Each broadside in the dataset was analysed for its raw emotion scores and a dominant emotion was identified for each piece. By grouping these emotions into yearly averages and 20-year intervals, the group found that trust, fear and joy were the predominant emotions in this data throughout the 19th century. There was a significant increase in joy toward the latter half of the century (1841–1900).
- integrating aesthetics, by focusing on a selection of colours and imagery to evoke specific emotions aligned with the project’s thematic analysis. The group drew upon research indicating that colours are often associated with emotions: for example, joy with yellow, fear with red, and trust with blue.
- grounding the project in historical context, by sourcing images from public domain archives, open-license repositories, and institutional databases.
Which datasets did these projects use?
These projects used the Broadsides printed in Scotland dataset:
Broadsides printed in Scotland 1650-1910 on the Data Foundry website