Stamen is offering classes in data visualization and web mapping at our Mission District studio, starting in June 2016!
These two classes are the first of what we hope will be an ongoing series of classes for individuals and organizations to learn from our experts, at the seat of where Stamen has been practicing data visualization and map making as a creative and technological discipline for 15 years.
I founded this studio in 2001. 15 years! So much has changed! Gah! What used to require highly skilled tinkerers to even start to play with data has transformed into multiple services that you can use to create data visualizations code-free, right in your browser. We’ve seen the birth of multiple online mapping platforms, Tableau and other data visualization-oriented software tools, and they’re getting better all the time. There’s never been a better time to be in the business of crafting strategic messages with maps and data visualization.
Perhaps the most important change I’ve seen is the development and wide acceptance of the incredible D3 library (side note: Mike Bostock, creator of D3.js, developed Polymaps during his internship at Stamen). Data visualization is everywhere, the barriers to entry are getting lower all the time, and there’s a thriving community and market within which this incredible medium we love that’s flourishing.
It’s part of our passion and mission to continue to help the industry at large improve skills and technologies to improve data-driven and visual story telling. We have a legacy of helping people learn to work with data to create interactive applications. Way back in 2009, Maps From Scratch saw Stamen partners Mike & Shawn sharing ‘mystical command-line incantations’ to early web adopters. Since then Maptime started at Stamen and we continue to support and participate in this community. And we love to teach our clients how to use the tools that we build for them to communicate about their data.
We’re delighted to continue and extend this tradition and offer educational opportunities from our San Francisco studio.
If you’re a dataviz practitioner, data journalist with basic web development or cartographic skills, or a developer who wants to improve your data visualization skills, we’d love it if you’d join us for these first sessions.
You can sign up here, and please let us know if you’ve got other ideas for things you’d like to learn about. Classes start on June 26, 2016. I hope to see you there!