The document provides tips for creating effective graphs and visuals for presentation slides. It discusses best practices for creating bar graphs, pie charts, and line graphs. Some key tips include using bar graphs to compare values, ordering bars from largest to smallest, making bars thick, and labeling values inside bars. For pie charts, it recommends placing the largest wedges at 12 o'clock and labeling values inside wedges. And for line graphs, it suggests making lines thick and writing series labels near the lines.

1. Effective Visuals Supplement
Daniel Beck
danielbeck@mac.com

2. ©Daniel Beck
These tips can help you (and your students)
create superior graphs for their presentation
slides.
Note: these tips are (mostly) speci
fi
c to slides
projected on a screen and not as much to
printed materials that can be studied at leisure.
Slidedeck available by request:
danielbeck@mac.com

3. ©Daniel Beck
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de
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nitions:
vertical
describes objects ranging from
bottom to top
bars
rectangles that represent
values

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use
✤ for comparing values
such as rank and size
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only use 2D

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put in order from largest to
smallest (or smallest to largest)
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make the bars tall and thick
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put values inside the bars
whenever possible
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turn o
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gridlines
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A
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de
fi
nitions:
horizontal
describes objects ranging from
left to right
bars
rectangles that represent values
A
B
C
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use
✤ for comparing values such as speed,
time and length
✤ useful for rank and size also when using
longer labels
A
B
C
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use horizontal bars instead of
vertical for long labels
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Apple iPhone Samsung Galaxy Google Pixel

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use horizontal bars instead of
vertical for long labels
Apple iPhone
Samsung Galaxy
Google Pixel
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only use 2D
A
B
C
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A
C
B
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put in order from largest to
smallest (or smallest to largest)
A
B
C
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make the bars tall and thick
A
B
C
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A
B
C
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put values inside the bars
whenever possible
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B
C
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26
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A
B
C
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17
26
53

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turn o
ff
gridlines
A
B
C
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17
26
53
A
B
C
0 15 30 45 60
17
26
53

21. ©Daniel Beck
Monthly Budget
April May June
July August September

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de
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nitions:
pie
a circle shape with wedges
wedge
a slice of a circle that extends from
the center to two points on the
edge

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use
to show proportions or
percentages (total must
equal 100%)

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tip 1
place the two most
important (or largest)
wedges at 12 o’clock

25. ©Daniel Beck
tip 2
place the remaining wedges in
order of size

26. ©Daniel Beck
tip 3
combine the data of the irrelevant
wedges

27. ©Daniel Beck
tip 4
use the color gray for
irrelevant data and label
it “others”
others

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tip 5
display the values
(numbers) inside the
wedges with high
contrast colors
26%
37%
36%

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tip 6
turn o
ff
the legend and
display labels inside of
wedges
26%
37%
36%
April Others September
others

30. ©Daniel Beck
tip 6
turn o
ff
the legend
and display labels
inside of wedges
September
26%
Others
37%
April
36%

31. ©Daniel Beck
tip 7
do not use 3D

32. ©Daniel Beck
tip 7
do not use 3D
September
26%
Others
37%
April
36%

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de
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nitions:
series
series of data; also called a line
legend
key of all series showing labels
and colors for each series
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use
to changes over time (trends)

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remove gridlines

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remove guidelines

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make lines thick

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make lines thick

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Region 1 Region 2
turn o
ff
legends

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turn o
ff
legends
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write series labels near the line
region 2
region 1

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write series label with the same color as the line
region 2
region 1

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talk about one series at a time
region 1

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talk about one series at a time
region 2
region 1

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de-emphasize series not being discussed
region 2
region 1