Solar Eclipse details in last 2 Millennia
Original Article Source: https://moonblink.info/Eclipse/lists/solcat
Original Data Set Source: https://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEsearch/SEsearch.php
Other Source: https://www.makeovermonday.co.uk/data/data-sets-2017/
Solar Eclipse is a phenomenon about which we hear every year. But there are most expects to this which we normally don’t pay attention to or simply ignore. Aspects like eclipse duration, eclipse category and magnitude are few factors which go unnoticed.
While the existing representation of the data is informative, it fails to attract the attention of the readers. Also, existing representation fails to highlight some key aspects about the eclipse which gives user more information. The current visualization has been created to address these aspects so that more and more readers get to know the details in a better represented visualization.
The data source is quite vast as it covers details for last 2 millennia (more then 2000 years!!!). So there were few limitations to the data. Some of the data entries were missing in terms of year, magnitude and eclipse category. While processing the data, some important factors like magnitude and duration were used and analyzed and some highly technical information was ignored to keep the audience in mind. The insights were drawn using Flourish tool to communicate the story in an interactive way.
I have chosen Flourish tool to represent my data story.
Solar Eclipse can be categorized in 4 categories: Total, Annular, Partial and Hybrid. The visualization will show a time based story with data starting from Year 0 to Year 2021. The Y-axis represents the duration of each eclipse category and size of the circle represents the magnitude of the eclipse, bigger the circle, more will be the magnitude.
The image on the left shows the details of the eclipse in the year 422.
The current visualization (https://public.flourish.studio/story/890323/) represents the data in an interactive manner as compared to the existing representation. Also, more aspects have been covered in this story like duration of the eclipse, magnitude and eclipse category. This story also shows a time-lapse of the eclipse details for about 2000 years! The color palette used is pleasing to the eyes of the reader and helps user absorb the data for so many years.