Buzzmachine Studios shares 41 infographics and features that make them great (or not so great) in this latest Slideshare.

1. 41 GREAT
(AND NOT SO GREAT)
INFOGRAPHICS

2. Such a simple concept that reveals so much
complexity and meaning. This graphic
isn’t rocket science, but it’s extremely well
designed and tells the story wonderfully.
Great execution.
1. The Mysterious Imagery of the Dollar Bill

3. If you’re a fan of data visualization projects, this one by Jay Carr is one
of the best we’ve seen. Jay is a fantastic visual storyteller, and the way
he handles the numbers here to help craft the story is a credit to his
talent and experience in the information graphics industry.
2. Houston Weather Records

4. 3. The Wall Street Journal’s Airline Profits infographic
An infographic shouldn’t be complicated.
This one is a great example of stripping
away unnecessary information and
using only what’s needed to deliver the
message. Simple and elegant with its
color-coded breakdown of expenses based
on the seat in the plane, it communicates
this surprising story so very well.

5. 4. The New York Time’s Hoping for an Upgrade Explainer
Sergio Peçanha does a masterful
job incorporating lots of whimsy
into this simple flow chart. The
text is sassy with loads of cheeky
humor, which goes perfectly with
the minimalist icons scattered
throughout the graphic.

6. 5. USA Todays’ Manned Mission to Mars process graphic
This graphic does a wonderful job
of simplifying a very complicated
process. The use of icons and
simple lines, along with flat
shapes representing the planets
and sun, explain what it would
take to send astronauts to Mars
in an easy-to-understand and
approachable way.

7. 6. The Illusion of Joey
First, Alberto Cuadra is one
of our favorite graphic artists
from the newspaper industry.
His work at El Mundo, The
Houston Chronicle (where he
worked with Jay Carr…see
graphic #2 in this list) and The
Washington Post has been
breathtaking in its frequency
and scope. What we love
about this graphic is that the
hand-drawn approach really
lends itself well to the tactile
nature of the puppetry that
makes the horse come to life.

8. 7. Brown’s Town Game 8
Another hand-drawn infographic, this
one produced by Chris Morris of the
Cleveland Plain Dealer. Chris does incredible
caricatures that remind us of Al Hirschfeld’s
work. Chris chooses a more cartoony
rendering style here that does a great job
of communicating technical and anecdotal
points equally well.

9. 8. The Hobbit
Ryan Huddle designed this layout that incorporates information graphic
elements and editorial content for this ‘Movies’ page in The Boston Globe.
There are so many little pieces and storytelling devices in this graphic, it’s hard
to decide what we love most. The nice thing about this graphic is that you can
get lost in it, but still enjoy every second of the time you spend with it.

10. 9. The Ups and Downs of the San Diego Chargers
Matt Perry, of U-T San Diego, produced this
wonderful data visualization summing up what the
last few years have been like for the NFL’s San Diego
Charger football franchise. Matt handles the statistics
masterfully and allows them to tell the story without
letting the graphic elements get in the way.

11. 10. Understanding Artisan Gelato
There are a lot of sins in this infoposter, not
the least of which is that it’s practically all big
type and illustrations that do little to help push
the story along. It’s eye candy with no real
substance. The biggest issue, though, is that
we don’t know where to begin reading. It’s
just a jumble and mish mash of trivia slapped
together with no hierarchy. It’s not memorable.
It doesn’t communicate well.
It’s just unappetizing.

12. 11. The Hunters and the Hunted
Adolfo Arranz centers this incredible infographic
for the South China Morning Post around a
beautifully rendered illustration of a whale being
pursued by a whaling ship. However, unlike the
previous graphic in our list, this illustration is not
only eye-catching, it also helps tell the story too.
With callouts and cross-section diagrams each
piece of art does its part to tell the story.

13. 12. Super Moments of the Super Bowl
After seeing this infographic appear in The Boston Globe, and on our good
friend and colleague Charles Apple’s visual journalism blog, we just had to post
something about it at buzzmachinestudios.com as well. Luke Knox did a great
job highlighting some of the most memorable Super Bowl moments from the
past in a fun and entertaining way.

14. 13. High-Bar Back Squat
Another artist whose work we’ve featured on our blog in the past is Ted
Slampyak. Ted does a lot of retro/nostalgia pieces for a blog/podcast called the
Art of Manliness. We love the old-school touches Ted uses in his work for AoM,
like the halftone screens, wide-kerned typography and quirky additions like the
strongman’s singlet and handlebar mustache. These storytelling devices help
reinforce AoM’s brand, and also make Ted’s graphics a joy to read.

15. 14. Under the Hill, the Other Side of the Water
Call us suckers for hand-drawn
graphics if you want to, but
using this technique can be a
powerful storytelling device.
As we saw in ‘The Illusion of
Joey’ graphic by Alberto Cuadra,
using hand-drawn artwork for
an infographic can subtly add
to the feeling of the message.
In this example, the artists from
Grupo Nacion did a magnificent
job with the cutaway drawing of
Bilbo Baggins’ hobbit hole. The
fact that the illustration is hand
drawn adds to the earthiness of
Bilbo’s home, ‘Bag End.’

16. 15. The History of the Olympics’ Summer Sports
This massive data visualization
from The Times of Oman provides
a complete history of the sporting
events from the first modern
Olympiad in Athens in 1896 up
through the games in London in
2012. It’s a huge undertaking, but
they told the story beautifully.

17. 16. How to Make Cupcakes
This wonderfully simple recipe infographic makes the task of preparing and
baking cupcakes look easy. The best part for us is the color-coded steps in
the process tied to the ‘Time Spent’ chart on the left side of the graphic. It’s a
subtle element that adds another layer of depth to this great infographic.

18. 17. Moonwalking: Then and Now
Another graphic by Jay Carr and Alberto
Cuadra when they worked together at
the Houston Chronicle. We love seeing
the side-by-side comparison of the
1969 technology NASA used then with
the current/near-future technology of
today’s space program. The 3D diorama
renderings are the right choice for this
high-tech piece, and the timeline across
the bottom adds depth to the story.

19. 18. Coca-Cola Bottling Process
This is one of our all-time
favorite pieces from our own
portfolio. It may be a little tacky
to toot our own horn by including
our work with these other great
information graphics on this
list, but with 100+ years of
collective experience in producing
infographics, eventually you have
to hit one out of the park. The
thing we love about this piece is
how we were able to distill the
complexity of the chaotic process
that happens inside a function
bottling facility into something a
person can easily understand.

20. 19. Brain Freeze explainer
Yes, this is another piece from our
archives. It’s not the most complex
graphic, but we love the whimsical
touches that add to the story here. They
pair wonderfully with the joy of eating ice
cream and the pain/pleasure that comes
with ‘brain freeze.’

21. 20. Microsoft Cloud Computing
It looks pretty, but this is another example of a bad infographic. As with the
previous bad example (#10 in this list), everything here is eye candy, and
there’s no hierarchy to help drive the narrative. There should be a focal point
to draw your eye to where the narrative begins, but all this graphic offers is a
hodgepodge of visual gimmicks. And what’s with that big straw
sticking through the ground?

22. 21. Olympic Medal Pyramid
Here’s another fantastically executed data
visualization infographic by the Times of Oman
staff. This is a really innovative approach to
the medal count graphics that are everywhere
around the time of each Olympic games. The
pyramid for each country is well designed and
it’s loaded with several layers of information
which makes this graphic that much better. Our
only gripe – it looks like the ‘medal race’ line
chart totals are swapped for the U.S. and China.
D’oh!

23. 22. Nokia Lumia 1020 Camera Phone
We love this graphic because it kind of has that technical drawing/exploded view
vibe happening, but it’s handled in a fun and intriguing way. The pullout facts
are also handled well, and are loaded with actual useful/helpful information.

24. 23. Pan Am: Building on a Legacy
We did a blog post on this piece as well. It was produced by our own Bill Haas for
a client who’d taken over some subsidiaries of Pan Am and was trying to revive
the businesses. It’s a fantastic example of a timeline for a subject that has a rich
and storied history.

25. 24. 70th Anniversary of the Attack on Pearl Harbor
The thing we love most about this piece is how it tells its story
in a relatively tight space. This version was built by Scott
Brown for the Orange County Register’s website. If only all
internet infographics in this format told their stories so well.

26. 25. Star Wars Episode IV Plot Summary
When we saw this infographic by Wayne Dorrington a few years back
we immediately saved a copy to our infographics morgue. We’re
huge fans of summarizing plots to famous tales using sequential
illustrations (see example #28 in this list), but stripping it down to
simple icons with no text at all to explain things was a real challenge.
However, it works well because the story is so familiar.

27. 26. Star Wars Episode V (part 1) Plot Summary
Apparently Wayne Dorrington got such great response from his
previous effort to summarize the plot of Star Wars that he decided
to plunge ahead and produce another set of summaries for Empire
Strikes Back. We’re glad he did because they’re excellent.
See slide #27 for part 2.
cont. ->

28. 27. Star Wars Episode V (part 2) Plot Summary

29. 28. Shakespeare’s Henry IV illustrated plot summary
How do you follow two great examples of plot
summaries using icons? With a plot summary of your
own, of course. We’ve been producing illustrated plot
summaries for The St. Louis Post-Dispatch and its
coverage of the Shakespeare Festival of St. Louis
for nearly 15 years. It’s always so much fun to cover
the event in this way, and it makes Shakespeare less
intimidating and more accessible for scores of people
who otherwise might pass up this wonderful event.

30. 29. Sopranos
What makes this infographic so
great is that while there is a lot of
information being presented, it’s
done in a very organized and easy-
to-follow way with each season
having its own section. What
makes this infographic so fun?
The death count for each episode
is labeled with a small symbol and
the rolling toll is calculated at the
end of each season.

31. 30. Wimbledon in Numbers
Does a grass texture for the background, some icons and big
type make a good infographic? Uh….no.

32. 31. Operation Holiday Magic
Our friends at The Villages Daily Sun created
this piece to run in the paper on Christmas Eve
2014. It’s a fantastic piece that tries to theorize
how Santa and his eight tiny reindeer are able
to deliver Christmas cheer to millions of homes
around the world in just 24 hours. Fun stuff, but I
think we’ve seen this somewhere before…
(see next example)

33. 32. The Science of Santa
Wait a minute! Now I remember where
I’ve seen that Santa Claus graphic from
slide #31. We did practically the same
piece on how Santa works his Christmas
magic exactly 10 years before the Villages
Daily Sun version came out. Well, I guess
imitation IS the sincerest form of flattery.
Actually, we do think both pieces have
their own unique qualities, and they both
prove that infographics don’t have to be
entirely based on actual facts, though
convincing some people that Santa isn’t a
real guy is harder than you might believe.

34. 33. Operation Holiday Magic
The Tremendousness Collective
is partly comprised of a group
of folks we used to work with
a long time ago at XPLANE –
perhaps the first information
graphics consultancy. TTC
produces lots of fun, attention-
getting work, and while this
piece is a little more tame than
some of their other projects, it
does a tremendous (pardon the
pun) job of telling the story here.
There are lots of subtle layers
of information, but yet it’s clean
with lots of whitespace to help
provide some focus.

35. 34. TIME magazine’s Health Hunt
We can’t even remember when this graphic was published by Time magazine.
It’s probably close to 10 years old, but it’s a wonderful example of using 3D
models to create a great visual explanation of how to shop healthy. We love the
bird’s-eye view perspective the 3D camera gives you in this image. It makes
everything clear and easy to follow, plus it has that fun Family Circus gimmick
to it. Are we dating ourselves with that reference?

36. 35. Thames Jubilee Pageant
We love this map-within-a-map infographic. Not only does this image highlight
landmarks along the Thames River that people can watch the parade of boats
from (as well as times the flotilla will passing those landmarks) but it also
provides a map of the ships in the flotilla itself. Brilliant!

37. 36. Tattoo Infographic
The best thing about this incredible
infographic is the execution. It’s an amazing
concept, and it demands that you read it. It’s
so convincing you almost believe it’s an actual
tattoo (it isn’t…we promise). This incredible
piece was produced by Paul Marcinkowski as
an art school project.

38. 37. ‘Sno Problem
Javier Zarracina has produced some truly
stunning infographics over the years. If
you’re not familiar with his work, do yourself
a favor and Google him. You won’t be sorry.
The thing we love most about this piece is
how Javier incorporated actual residents’
stories and anecdotes into the graphic. This
is a wonderful storytelling tool that helps
other readers identify with the issue.

39. 38. Hurricane Hugo’s Havoc
If you’re unfamiliar with the work of Bill Pitzer,
run to your web browser right now and do a
Google search. Bill’s been creating extraordinary
infographics for over 30 years. His Hurricane Hugo
graphic presented here is chocked full of layer after
layer of incredible information. He has a portfolio
of work that is solid gold, and he gets too little
credit for his amazing talent.

40. 39. How Coffee Works
Dan Zettwoch is another
former colleague from
our days at XPLANE. Dan
works incredibly fast and
produces some of the
most fun and compelling
infographics we’ve ever
seen. This infographic on
growing, processing and
consuming coffee is lively
and entertaining, and it
communicates the concept
in an approachable way.

41. 40. Adrenaline: Fight or Flight
Another piece from Dan Zettwoch
that handles a pretty technical
subject in a fun, lighthearted way,
and most importantly communicates
the concept effectively.

42. 41. Facts About Facebook
This graphic is just a jumble of disjointed
statistics, badly handled charts and a huge
cityscape illustration on the left that does
nothing to advance the message.

43. CONCLUSION
3564 Avalon Park Blvd. E • Suite 1, #101 • Orlando, Florida
32828 • www.buzzmachinestudios.com • 314.330.5194
@buzzmachinestud /in/johndtelford
Using an infographic will enable you to visually explain complex concepts or large sets of
numbers in a way your reader will easily understand and remember. But, coming up with
an infographic is like solving a puzzle: all the pieces must fit in just the right place for the
picture to be clear.
We hope this Slideshare offered you some insight on deciphering the good from the bad
when it comes to infographics and maybe helped you in deciding if this is the right route for
the information or data you are trying to showcase.