I sometimes come across data visualisations that takes my breath away. This is one. Created by the design house Kram/Weisshaar for the CeBit 2014 computer expo in Hannover. Wish I was there.

It is of course the sheer size that makes an impact, but the visualisations themselves are amazing, the amount of data accessed mindblowing, and the integration of visuals and the physical space exemplary. Here is a quote from the designers themselves:

…repository of human culture and activity, able to tackle and articulate the complexity, breadth and depth of the information available within virtual spaces. A 3.000 square meter, floor-to-ceiling terapixel graphic makes manifest the largesse of Big Data, the theme of this year’s CODE_n. The designers imagine systems beyond human perception and use custom code to plot massive amounts of data on spectacular canvases.

Yes, this is real data, from a huge amount of sources. The images almost speaks for themselves, though I wish I could findmore detailed photographs.

“Gigantic scales representing human knowledge from 1088 to 2008. Using Google Book archive of 4 billion pages and hundred of search terms related to politics, economics, engineering, science, technology, math and philosophy. This in sum demonstrates our histories, beliefs, concepts, theories and inventions.”(excerpt from  Kram/Weisshaar pages.)

“Hydrosphere hyperwall shows the global oceans as dynamic pathways. Sea climate, data-collecting mini-robots and ocean creatures; and current systems. Using massive amounts of satellite and on-ocean data interwoven with oceanic big data to describe forces, flow, wind directions.” (excerpt from  Kram/Weisshaar pages.)

“The ultimate complex network, the human brain. Extracted from MRIs, millions of fibre bundles, neural connections and white matter tracts are visualised. Including anomalies such as tissue damage in Alzheimer patients, to the neural basis of morality.”  (excerpt from  Kram/Weisshaar pages.)