My #1 and #2 Pick

My top two picks were interchangeable until the very end and my top selection, in the end, reflected my slight preference for minimal design over maximal design.

1. Frieder Knauss

I can add very little to the appreciation circulating on this site except to say that Mr. K manages the hat trick of a) personal retrospection, b) data design, and (the rarity) c) editorial.

That he does this in several thousand fewer pixels than all of his competitors is to his credit, as is the vomit-themed color palette which he somehow sells as an element of his NCLB nausea.

2. Sam Shah

That Sam didn’t place speaks to the overall quality of the entire slate. From fonts to colors to axes and grids, none of his design choices cohere. Yet he tosses them all on the same wall with a stuffed buck and the whole thing looks like some kind of genius aneurysm. The herkyjerky, undistributed, unaligned tabs on his “Blog Hits” slide are a particular high point for me.

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I'm Dan and this is my blog. I'm a former high school math teacher and current head of teaching at Desmos. He / him. More here.

5 Comments

  1. I’ll second the accolades of Sam’s work – I really was wishing for just one more slot so I could sneak him in.

    Given how all of my choices did, though, I suspect that I have a rather quirky/unfinished/contrarian design sense.

    Once again, I enjoyed the project.

    Thanks, Dan!

  2. Aw, thanks Dan! I too love love love the herky-jerky bar graph. It was my favorite thing too. Especially because it arose a bit accidentally. The rest of the slides, though, personally, I knew I should have redone. (Or at least not done them while my Calc class was watching Stand & Deliver… *grin*.)

    Sam.