Illustrative halos in information visualization

ABSTRACT

In many interactive scenarios, the fast recognition and localization of crucial information is very important to effectively perform a task. However, in information visualization the visualization of permanently growing large data volumes often leads to a simultaneously growing amount of presented graphical primitives. Besides the fundamental problem of limited screen space, the effective localization of single or multiple items of interest by a user becomes more and more difficult. Therefore, different approaches have been developed to emphasize those items -- mainly by manipulating the items size, by suppressing the whole context or by adding supplemental visual elements (e.g., contours, arrows). This paper introduces the well known illustrative technique of haloing to information visualization to address the localization problem. Applying halos emphasizes items without a manipulation of size or an introduction of additional visual elements and reduces the context suppression to a locally defined region. This paper also presents the results of a first user-study to get an impression of the usefulness of halos for a faster recognition.

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INDEX TERMS

Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.5 INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (I.7)
      H.5.0 General

General Terms:
Design, Experimentation, Human Factors, Verification

Keywords:
halos, illustrative rendering, illustrative visualization, information visualization