James Grant, Todd Spencer, Richard Armijo: Stoc (Stock Ticker Orbital Comparison)
Artist(s):
Title:
- Stoc (Stock Ticker Orbital Comparison)
Exhibition:
Creation Year:
- 2009
Category:
Artist Statement:
STOC is an interactive data visualization, using the metaphor of a planetary system, that maps parameters of stocks in the S&P 500 to animated visual outputs. Existing methods for displaying large amounts of stock-market data do not easily allow comparison between companies, as the data are often presented in tabular format. Some solutions implement a price-over-time graph, with the option of layering on additional stocks or market indices for comparison. STOC allows immediate comparison of hundreds or thousands of stocks, by mapping various stock-specific parameters (such as price percent change, earnings per share, volume, market capitalization, dividend yield, moving average, and comparison to the group average) to easily observable visual outputs (such as size, color, opacity, stroke width, satellite size, orbital distance, orbital direction, and speed).
This visualization is particularly suited for comparisons between items, as users can immediately identify the largest, or reddest, or quickest item in the group. Users control the overall speed, zoom level, and clustering, and they can extract parametric details for each individual element in the group. This system is not limited to displaying stock-market data, and could be used in a wide range of statistical visualizations. For example, one could visualize the parameters of students in a university (such as grade-point average, credit completion rate, total credits, and student account balance) or the parameters of daily weather (daily temperature range, relative humidity, wind speed, precipitation, and comparison to record highs and lows).
