Infoviz Graffiti: an Adjustable Pie-Chart Stencil
9 June 2011 / infovis, projectI designed an adjustable lasercut stencil, suitable for the rapid deployment of pie-chart infographics.
The design comes with a set of re-arrangeable letters. Changing the message and percentage is straightforward.
The stencil has some noteworthy design features:
- The letters are designed to be held in place with adhesive tape.
- The pie chart pointer is held in place by an adjustable-tension bolt and wing-nut.
- A small cutout arrow indicates which portion of the statistic is being described by your text.
- The perimeter of the pie chart is etched with 100 tick-marks, making it easy to adjust its percentage.
- The letters (a new stencilized version of Trade Gothic) preserve correct character widths and are provided in proportion to letter frequency (e.g. ETAOIN SHRDLU).
Here are the stencil designs (Illustrator CS4 .PDF format):
If you’d like to make one for yourself, you’ll need:
- 1/8″ (3mm) thick sheet material, suitable for lasercutting. I used MDF, but acrylic is fine.
- A one-inch 1/4″-20 bolt, wing-nut and suitable pair of washers.
- Scotch tape or masking tape (to hold the letter in the stencil)
- 1 quart-capacity Ziploc bag (for storing the letters)
- Spray paint
- A laser cutter!
Additional documentation
I’ve written an article (“Some thoughts on infographic street art“), in response to interview questions by Nicola Bozzi and Suzanne LaBarre, explaining some of my thinking behind this project. Photographs for this project are available in high resolution in this Flickr photoset.
Press
“A provocative exhortation to get the substance of immediate information and infuse it with the boldness of political rage, hopefully defacing public properties and informing people at once.” — Nicola Bozzi
- Aw, Jean. “Infoviz Graffiti: DIY Pie Chart Stenciling”. Notcot, 6/11/2011.
- Bozzi, Nicole. “Golan Levin’s Infoviz Graffiti, or Communicating Dissent In a Short Attention Span World”. Owni.eu, 6/23/2011.
- LaBarre, Suzanne. “Infographiti: Golan Levin Brings Data Viz To The Street”. FastCompany Design, 6/16/2011.
- Stone, Zak. “Customizable Stencil Lets Anyone Make Street Art Infographics”. GOOD Design, 6/15/2011.
- Van de Moere, Andrew. “Infovis Graffiti: Spray Painting Infographics in the Wild”. Infosthetics.com, 6/10/2011.
References for quoted statistics
- USA consumes 25% of the worlds’ energy.
- Women earn 77% per dollar of men.
- Ocean life depleted 90% since 1950.
Acknowledgements
This 4-hour Speed Project was supported by the STUDIO for Creative Inquiry at CMU. Thanks to Asa Foster III for production assistance, and to Nicola Bozzi and Suzanne LaBarre for their provocative interview questions.
License
Infoviz Graffiti Adustable Pie Chart Stencil by Golan Levin is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Keywords
infoviz, infovis, infographics, information graphics, data visualization, information visualization, dataviz bombing, viz graffiti, grafitti, graffiti research, graf technology, street art, tactical media, contextual infosthetics, urban messaging, locative infographics, situated visualization, chart junk, pie chart stencil, adjustable pie chart, piechart, lasercut, laser cutter, digital fabrication, template, stencil, spray paint, spraypaint, speed project, fffffat lab.
21 Responses to “Infoviz Graffiti: an Adjustable Pie-Chart Stencil”
A Processing Parser for SubRip Subtitle Files» Next post: See Yourself Sensing (London Exhibition)
June 9th, 2011 at 7:26 pm
[…] fabrication info (including high-res photos) is available here. If you’d like to make one for yourself, you’ll […]
June 10th, 2011 at 3:34 am
[…] lasercut stencil, which can be used to spray paint pie chart data graphics anywhere in the street. Infovis Graffiti [flong.com] includes an adjustable pie chart stencil and a collection of re-arrangeable letters and […]
June 10th, 2011 at 4:29 am
[…] решитесь заняться этим, по сслыке макет, который можно скачать и изготовить трафарет […]
June 15th, 2011 at 9:01 am
[…] Golan Levin, creating politically charged graffiti just got a bit easier. The fully customizable “Infoviz Graffiti” toolkit allows users to quickly swap out the numbers and letters and adjust the slice of the pie.The […]
June 15th, 2011 at 9:02 am
[…] stencil design is available as a PDF on Levin’s blog. The raw materials—fiberboard, a wing-nut, tape to hold the letters up, and your choice of spray […]
June 15th, 2011 at 3:42 pm
[…] real world pie-chart stencil/maker by the new media artist Golan […]
June 15th, 2011 at 3:44 pm
[…] real world pie-chart stencil/maker by the new media artist Golan […]
June 16th, 2011 at 12:00 am
[…] F.A.T speed challenge, the ”Infoviz Graffiti” is a stencil that can be downloaded from Levin’s blog and created at home. The design includes a set of re-arrangable letters, a pie chart with […]
June 17th, 2011 at 3:02 pm
[…] Es interesante leer todos sus comentarios. Les dejo los enlaces originales a las notas sobre el proyecto: Some thoughts on infographic street art y Infoviz Graffiti: an Adjustable Pie-Chart Stencil […]
June 19th, 2011 at 4:32 pm
[…] lasercut stencil, which can be used to spray paint pie chart data graphics anywhere in the street. Infovis Graffiti [flong.com] includes an adjustable pie chart stencil and a collection of re-arrangeable letters and […]
June 20th, 2011 at 11:02 am
[…] is difficult. But, I will continue with other nice things I saw on the web today. I enjoyed the customizable stencil that artist Glan Levin came up with (also found via Good). I like how he co-opted the “street art” thing, and married it […]
June 20th, 2011 at 6:24 pm
[…] • 2:24 am No Comments A very cool idea to make “Infographic-Stencils” from Golan Levin. Tags: Graffiti, Infographic Previous postThe Story of a Long […]
June 22nd, 2011 at 10:13 am
[…] idea for his ‘Infoviz Graffiti’ stencil came to artist Golan Levin during a four hour ‘Speed Project’ at Carnegie Mellon […]
June 22nd, 2011 at 10:54 am
[…] your stencil… then spray it anywhere, with data collected… well… check it out here […]
June 23rd, 2011 at 4:35 am
[…] makes a statement through its self-evident utility. When I came across Golan Levin’s Infoviz Graffiti Pie-Chart kit, I immediately thought it was the […]
June 28th, 2011 at 12:41 pm
[…] Download the printable stencil here. […]
June 28th, 2011 at 11:49 pm
[…] storia dei graffiti e dei writer. Deluso, decide di fare da sé. In quattro ore mette insieme uno stencil open-source con cui spruzzare grafici sui muri. Un accrocchio con cui tirare fuori le infografiche […]
June 29th, 2011 at 11:48 pm
[…] Whenever I'm out late at night with my bottle of black spray paint while climbing onto the highway overpass, I'm always like, "I wish there was an easier way to make pie charts on this street sign. There has to be a better way!" I am sure you can identify. Well fret no more. Golan Levin, an artist and educator, provides you with the open-source pie chart stencil. […]
June 30th, 2011 at 5:47 am
[…] The letters (a new stencilized version of Trade Gothic) preserve correct character widths and are provided in proportion to letter frequency (e.g. ETAOIN SHRDLU). via Infoviz Graffiti: an Adjustable Pie-Chart Stencil – flong.com […]
June 30th, 2011 at 9:45 am
[…] Pie chart infographic stencil – from FLONG […]
July 4th, 2011 at 7:01 pm
[…] un’informazione (socialmente utile) chiara e semplice, vai nel mondo a diffonderla. Sul blog di Levins trovate il pdf da scaricare, nel caso vogliate divertirvi a realizzarlo da […]