Book: The Atlas of the Real World by Daniel Dorling, Mark Newman & Anna Barford

As people become less receptive to the linear arrangement of data, such as tables and pie charts, designers are experimenting with visual approaches, creating innovative and intuitive ways of communicating information. A new book, thick with examples, offers new ideas on drawing the world atlas.

The Atlas of the Real World, published by Thames & Hudson, is full of cartograms based on the traditional world map, edited so that each country’s size is relative to its demographic importance, with each country proportioned to represent its health and wealth, for example, rather than its land area. The resulting morphed maps are stretched and reformed, often creating a new global hierarchy, with countries such as Switzerland becoming the largest in the world when territories are sized according to machinery exports.

The Atlas of the Real World opens up new possibilities for cartographic information, by demonstrating how data can be turned into a visual experience without the need for graphical overlays or charts. Will we soon see similar technology used in PowerPoint presentations, livening up dry datasets?