LogAbacus

by Dataviz Cowboy

The abacus is one of the most ancient tool to perform mathematical operations. Inspired by its principles, this dataviz project distributes uniformly along wires the result of different formulas applied to sampled numbers from 0.01 to 500.

The result of the formulas is displayed clockwise. Those values closer to 0 are located in the inner rings, which grow logarithmically towards the outer ones. The third significative figure is displayed in concentric wires when you zoom, drag and click on one of the white dots.

This dataviz is dynamic. If you change the formula in the dropdown menu, the result is updated in the abacus, the beads find their new place, giving a hint of which values are most affected, and where the new terms in the formula take us into the diagram.