During the week of October 28th, 2007, Sacramento was host to over 750 attendees at the IEEE Visualization Conference (Vis), Information Visualization Conference (InfoVis), and the Visual Analytics Science and Technology Symposium (VAST). Students from around the world, researchers and developers from a wide array of commercial, government, and academic institutions, as well as exhibitors, publishers, media personnel, and artists were brought together for a week by their shared interest in visualization.
A common theme in this year’s event was that visualization is no longer just a research endeavor, but is an integral part of everyday life. The InfoVis Keynote, given by Matthew Ericson, Deputy Graphics Director of The New York Times, covered just how quickly late-breaking information must be processed into an accurate and compelling format for inclusion in the next day’s paper. In the combined InfoVis Capstone and VAST Keynote, Stephen Few from Perceptual Edge and the University of California, Berkeley, discussed the perception of information visualization from outside the community. Chris Johnson, from the University of Utah explained how visual data analysis is much more than just pretty pictures in the Vis Capstone. Looking to the future, the Vis Keynote presented by Rick Stevens from Argonne National Laboratory and The University of Chicago, covered some open visualization challenges in large-scale computational and theoretical biology.
In addition to these four keynote / capstone presentations, the week included paper sessions, posters, tutorials, workshops, exhibits, a scientific animation theater, two contests, and an art show. The topics covered in these sessions were as diverse as the attendees, yet shared the common goal of presenting data in a manner that fosters understanding and insight. The week offered many opportunities for the attendees to meet with one another and share experiences and ideas during the long coffee and lunch breaks, and at the two evening receptions.
In 2008, Vis, InfoVis, and VAST will be collectively known as VisWeek, and will be held in Columbus, Ohio from October 19th through the 24th. Visit the web sites listed below for further information:
Vis 2008: http://vis.computer.org/vis2008
InfoVis 2008: http://conferences.computer.org/infovis/infovis2008
VAST 2008: http://conferences.computer.org/vast/vast2008