Improving Visual Comparison Across Multiple Views with Shadow Marks
Abstract
Making spatial comparisons in visualizations with multiple views is often difficult (e.g., comparing locations is difficult across small multiples, and overlay techniques quickly become cluttered). To improve multi-view spatial comparisons, we developed Shadow Marks – visual marks that are replicated across all views – that provide a common spatial reference frame at the location where a comparison needs to be made. We evaluated Shadow Marks through three crowdsourced studies that explored different visual-analytics tasks. Study results show that Shadow Marks consistently led to more accurate answers than either a small-multiples grid or an overlay. Shadow Marks also required less effort and were strongly preferred, showing that user-controlled spatial reference frames can improve multiple-view comparison.
BibTeX
@inproceedings{10.1007/978-3-032-05005-2_11,
author = {Baker, Adam and Gutwin, Carl and Matejka, Justin and Stavness, Ian},
title = {Improving Visual Comparison Across Multiple Views with Shadow Marks},
year = {2025},
isbn = {978-3-032-05004-5},
publisher = {Springer-Verlag},
address = {Berlin, Heidelberg},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-032-05005-2_11},
doi = {10.1007/978-3-032-05005-2_11},
abstract = {Making spatial comparisons in visualizations with multiple views is often difficult (e.g., comparing locations is difficult across small multiples, and overlay techniques quickly become cluttered). To improve multi-view spatial comparisons, we developed Shadow Marks – visual marks that are replicated across all views – that provide a common spatial reference frame at the location where a comparison needs to be made. We evaluated Shadow Marks through three crowdsourced studies that explored different visual-analytics tasks. Study results show that Shadow Marks consistently led to more accurate answers than either a small-multiples grid or an overlay. Shadow Marks also required less effort and were strongly preferred, showing that user-controlled spatial reference frames can improve multiple-view comparison.},
booktitle = {Human-Computer Interaction – INTERACT 2025: 20th IFIP TC 13 International Conference, Belo Horizonte, Brazil, September 8–12, 2025, Proceedings, Part III},
pages = {202–223},
numpages = {22},
keywords = {Shadow Marks, Visual Comparison, Small Multiples},
location = {Belo Horizonte, Brazil},
}