Understanding the Brief

We have been tasked with creating a dashboard on a selected area of life. The information that we present should be generalised, rather than of specific interest to ourselves.

The brief outlines that we should research, collect, or generate data related to our chosen subject and visualise it across 3–6 interconnected dashboards. There are a number of guidelines that we should follow to ensure what we create meets the specification of the brief.

The screens that we include should:

• Focuses on a specific question or theme
• Uses charts fit for purpose (not decorative)
• Shows clear hierarchy and layout
• Can be understood independently but works as part of a system

Given the list that we have been provided with in the brief; we have several options for the focus of our dashboard;

• A City in Numbers, which may include transport, housing, weather, population, pollution, public services.
• A Fitness or Health System (Generalised, not personal), which may include activity types, goals, averages, comparisons, progress metrics.
• An Event or Festival Overview which may include attendance, schedules, stages, ticket sales, demographics.
• A Sustainability / Environmental System which may include energy usage, recycling, emissions, water consumption, trends.
• A School / University Data System which may include attendance, coursework, grades, engagement, facilities usage.

My Dashboard

I have chosen to present an sustainability/environmental system, with a focus on NI specifically. I was initially going to show UK and Ireland stats, but felt that something a bit more focused and local may give more interesting results, as well as creating a more personalised experience for a selected target audience.

Research

Visual Inspiration

I gathered some inspiration from existing dashboards. Through this, I found the more simple dashboard layouts to be more impactful than ones that were very busy. Having a focus on tables, simple colours and the information itself creates a visually appealing board without any distractions from the information being presented. A few examples of dashboards I like are shown below.