This article first appeared in BTS Issue 2.
By Zhou Zhi, Sophomore
Engineering Systems and Design
We were tasked to develop a large screen display for the Bank of Beijing (BOB) at their newly established Nanjing headquarters. This is probably one of the toughest yet more rewarding challenges that I have faced. We can all plot graphs and charts, but data visualisation isn’t as simple as that. It involved a whole new field of study into visual cognition, graphic design, data processing, and lots of coding. This field is also where cross-discipline learning comes in handy.
To be frank, it is a bombardment of knowledge. Within the span of three months or so, we
learnt three coding languages of JavaScript , HTML and CSS, visualisation principles, banking industry jargon and more. And putting all these knowledge into the making of our screen from scratch leads to my best and toughest times. The endless debugging and revamping of design, though often frustrating and demoralising, sometimes brought the team new insights to the problem and alternative ways of coding and design.
Data visualisation is a tool that helps us see and understand the patterns and trends within big data. For BOB, we helped them in visualising their revenue and assets. For us, it is a visualisation of our ability and potential. A big thank you to SUTD for giving us such an experience. And that too, for BOB that we Vis-ed.
Read more about the summer adventure of the team from “Visual Design of the Comprehensive Intelligent Large Screen” at the Asian Leadership Programme here.
 at their newly established Nanjing headquarters. This is probably one of the toughest yet more rewarding challenges that I have faced. We can all plot graphs and charts, but data visualisation isn’t as simple as that.){kind=link}