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Why visualization?

Person using VR

Visual Arena is a neutral innovation platform under Lindholmen Science Park's program portfolio that initiates and runs projects that respond to complex problems. Our tools to achieve insights and results are visualization, curiosity and creativity in our experimental innovation and design approach and meet answers and solutions that matter most to society, organizations and individuals.

You as an organization can come here with your or society's challenges, in an innovation project where we bring together several experts, we seek answers to the challenge. Are you curious and want to know more? Contact us

Folk står runt om kring en dator i en filmstudio

Visualization is a way of communicating, a tool that enriches our way of expression and helps us to understand and experience.

graf

By developing and using visualizations, we can simplify and illustrate contexts that are hidden in large amounts of data or are beyond the capabilities of our senses.

Visual Arenas programledare blir påbyggad teknik och VR Headset i ett mörkt rum som är fint belyst med scenljus.

A way to communicate

Visualization is a way of communicating, a tool that broadens our ability to describe and helps us understand and experience.

 

Examples of valuable effects visualization can have:

  • bridging barriers
  • simplifies and clarifies
  • creates power for change
  • illustrates the thought and the measured

"The best way to get high bandwidth between a human and the computer is to use visualization"

Anders Ynnerman Visual Forum 2020

Our expert skills

Informationsvisualisering över våra fokusområde,: informationsvisualisering, XR, digitala tvillingar, Metaverse och förändringsledning. Olika ikoner syns tillsammmans med text som symboliserar detta.

Discover our innovation projects where we use visualization as a tool to meet challenges

Tomatoes in new york

Digital twin for circular food systems

The goal of this project is to address the challenges arising from the transition to circular food systems combined with adapting to digital information structures and resources. By combining these...
Visualisering

Norm-critical visualisation – preliminary study

Research shows that stereotypical images of people are often used in visualisations of future urban environments. A new collaborative project is planned in an effort to study and change that.
Bild på blommor på fält. Fotot är taget med kort skräpedjupt så att att de blommor som är närmast är det fokus på och bakgrunden är suddig.

Sustainable home development via increased MIK

In the project, an educational model for intergenerational film production about the future of local natural and cultural heritage in Västra Götaland and Europe is created.
Logotype Architectural Visualization Day

Architectural Visualization Day

Architectural Visualization Day is an annual meeting place for architectural visualizers, 3D graphic designers and others with interest in the visual realism, artistic creations and visualization...
Tram in Gothenburg

Climate neutral Gothenburg 2030

In order to meet major societal challenges such as climate change, the pace of conversion and cities' ability to develop solutions for tomorrow's problems needs to increase. There are no technical...
Digital 1600-talsstad, visualiserad ovanifrån

Digital city model 17th century

A collaborative project where you will develop a virtual model of Gothenburg from the 17th century. The purpose is to give a picture of what Gothenburg looked like in terms of urban development when...
3D visualization of Gothenburg

Digital Twin Cities Centre

Cutting-edge research is conducted in eight different research areas, covering all aspects needed to develop large-scale digital twins.
A picture that depicts a portrait of a woman, the portrait seems to be painted in oil paint giving it an old feeling, but then there is 3D glitch effects which gives the picture a modern twist. On the painting the words FEAR SOME is written in a modern font and in pink

Dream

The Dream project is an initiative aimed at redefining performing arts through innovative methods and exploratory practices. The project is part of Visual Arena's Residency for Innovators in Art (RIA)...
Ett barn på ett torg med människor leker med såpbubblor

Driving Inclusive Urban Development across Europe

The Citiverses Uniting for Inclusiveness project (CU Project) - We are gathering European leading smart cities, companies and universities in a vision for an inclusive, accessible digital twin...
Photo of Magdalenefjorden

Expanded rephotography

The research project is based on the premise that we need new ideas about the complex effect of global warming and climate change as a result. Artistic research can expand the tools that science has...
Kvinnor står framför en stor färgglad skräm

Experience to Insights Lab

The Experience to Insights Lab is our venture where, through students, we carry out design and innovation sprints to meet complex challenges. Are you a student or employee at a university and are you...
buttons falling on a blancket

Fearsome Things

Ett pågående projekt inom Visual Arenas Residency for Innovators in Art arbetar med att skapa en immersiv föreställning av En midsommarnattsdröm av William Shakespeare, planerad att framföras sommaren...

Fewer stereotypes when the cities of the future are visualised

Research shows that stereotypical images of people are often used in visualisations of future urban environments. A new collaborative project is planned in an effort to study and change that. With use...
Color, visuals and a woman singing on stage

First the Air is Blue: immersive technology, music and visual storytelling

As part of the Visual Arena Residency for Innovators in Art, Alicia Lazaro Arteaga and Akshay Sarode embarked on a exploration of immersive technology, music, and visual storytelling. Through four...

First the Air is Blue: immersive technology, music and visual storytelling - Cloned

As part of the Visual Arena Residency for Innovators in Art, Alicia Lazaro Arteaga and Akshay Sarode embarked on a exploration of immersive technology, music, and visual storytelling. Through four...
testbadd visualarena

Framework for unique test bed

Together with the city of Gothenburg, Visual Arena is preparing to develop a unique test bed linked to the city’s digital information, with the goal of identifying needs, making data and technology...
ny illustration

Go:innovation fas 3

Go: innovation phase 3 is a Vinnova-funded project that runs until 2023. In the third phase of the innovation platform's development, there is a continued focus on the development of culture and...
Go smart

Go:smart

The projekt Go:smart developed and tested an innovative travel broker service that facilitated and rewarded sustainable travelling in urban areas. The budget was 20 million SEK over two years, with 10...
En skog med personer och en hjort

GULD: Visualization to Teach Middle School Students About Biodiversity

GULD is an education and innovation project aimed at developing and exploring new ways to teach middle school students about biodiversity through visualization techniques. Based on extensive research...
svartvitt foto. Forskare med flygplansvinge i ett platt vitt landskap.

Methods for digital diagnosis of endangered cultural heritage

The impact of climate change on cultural environments and monuments that are difficult to access is a challenge for cultural environment conservation. The project investigates how experts in different...
monki logo

Monki R&D

The project developed concepts in the borderland between the digital and analogue in collaboration with the clothing chain Monki and their customers.
vr narrative vr lab

Narrative VR Lab

Narrative VR Lab is an innovative development project at Visual Arena in which we explore the narrative possibilities of XR (the umbrella term for VR, AR, MR and other media) and test new ways of...

Narrative VR Lab 1

Narrative VR Lab has now decided which projects it will support to create a pilot, and these are Medusa by Sara Tirelli and The Trojan by Meira Ahmemulic.

 

Benefits and effects


By developing and using visualizations, we can simplify and illustrate contexts that are hidden in large amounts of data or are beyond the capabilities of our senses. Many research fields today are dependent on these powerful and interactive visualizations, and large community building projects are today unthinkable without visualization if citizens are to be able to participate in the democratic process. It is important not to stop without further developing our knowledge of visualizations as it provides increased opportunities to effectively analyze and visualize data sets that can contribute to crucial explanations of complex relationships and abstract theories. Through such a process, visualization can contribute to increased societal benefits, new opportunities for innovation, a concrete collaboration between research, companies, organizations, authorities and the general public.

Contributes to innovation and democracy

Visualization was recognized as a scientific discipline more than 30 years ago, and since then the research community has been relatively unanimous about the definition and significance of what visualization means. Simply explained, visualization means an illustration of complex, multidimensional, contexts through expressions that are adapted to the human sense of sight. Visualization can take place, for example, through images, diagrams, simulations and animations. A more academic definition is: the use of computer-supported interactive, visual representations of (abstract) data to amplify cognition.

Visualization is an area under very strong expansion, where increased insights into the benefits of communicating with the help of images go hand in hand with the increased technical possibilities of creating interactive and dynamic visualizations. By developing and using visualizations, we can simplify and illustrate contexts that are hidden in large amounts of data or are beyond the capabilities of our senses. Many research fields today are dependent on these powerful and interactive visualizations, and large community building projects are today unthinkable without visualization if citizens are to be able to participate in the democratic process. It is important not to stop without further developing our knowledge of visualizations as it provides increased opportunities to effectively analyze and visualize data sets that can contribute to crucial explanations of complex relationships and abstract theories. Through such a process, visualization can contribute to increased societal benefits, new opportunities for innovation, concrete collaboration between research, companies, organizations, authorities and the general public.

We constantly use visual information to control our motor skills and to gather information. As soon as the light hits the retina, a process starts in the brain to interpret what we see and draw conclusions about how we should act or react. Therefore, visual information is very important when interacting with the outside world and when transferring knowledge.

Better decisions based on visualization

Through visualization, different individuals can get the same picture of a plan or event. It makes it possible to communicate across barriers such as gender, culture and age. However, it is important to understand that visualization can also be deceived. You can also make nice visualizations of bad or incomplete data, so do not forget to be source critical when looking at visualizations.

Thanks to the rapid development in hardware and software, we have also become better at understanding how our vision actually works, how we humans interpret and analyze images. The core of visualization is that we try to divide the workload between computer and people. Computers count quickly and correctly, and humans are good at seeing context and analyzing images, which can lead to better decisions. Therefore, visualization is important in many areas. Visualization creates an opportunity for several actors to see the same thing in front of them. One has e.g. seen clear gains in time efficiency in terms of decisions about construction when going from 2D to 3D drawings in the decision process.

A visualization can be a hand-drawn sketch or an image created with a computer program. When it comes to making large amounts of data comprehensible, different forms of diagrams or maps are used, and then we talk about information visualization. Visualization is used, among other things, to explain planned changes in the urban environment, statistical relationships and medical interventions. It is an important tool with great democratic and pedagogical potential.

With today's powerful computers, it is possible to create spectacular visualizations. You can travel into the human body and make exploration trips to other galaxies or down to the depths of the sea.

The need to show and illustrate information to others has existed as long as there have been people. From early cave paintings in southern Europe via the first maps to today's visualizations of complex information in various fields such as medicine, geography and computer science.

Want to know more about visualization?

We have a unique network and broad expertise in the field of visualization. Visualization is used today in many different industries such as healthcare, urban planning and computer science. Contact us for more information.

Event där visualisering möter brännande utmaningar 

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Visual Arena, Gothenburg
Gradient, rosa och mörklila

Explore Virtual Worlds Event Series 2

Join us for this event series where we will explore the best virtual worlds and VR applications...
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Visual Arena, Göteborg
A picture that depicts a portrait of a woman, the portrait seems to be painted in oil paint giving it an old feeling, but then there is 3D glitch effects which gives the picture a modern twist. On the painting the words FEAR SOME is written in a modern font and in pink

Creative Workshop to Shape the Future of Theatre!

As part of our Residency for Innovators in Art, Visual Arena and Fearsome Thing are hosting a two...
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Visual Arena, Göteborg
A picture that depicts a portrait of a woman, the portrait seems to be painted in oil paint giving it an old feeling, but then there is 3D glitch effects which gives the picture a modern twist. On the painting the words FEAR SOME is written in a modern font and in pink

Creative Workshop to Shape the Future of Theatre!

As part of our Residency for Innovators in Art, Visual Arena and Fearsome Thing are hosting a two...
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Visual Arena, Lindholmspiren 3, Gothenburg
Gradient, rosa och mörklila

Explore Virtual Worlds Event Series 3

Join us for this event series where we will explore the best virtual words and Metaverse...
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Visual Arena Lindholmspiren 3, Gothenburg
Gradient, rosa och mörklila

Explore Virtual Worlds Event Series 4

Join us for this event series where we will explore the best virtual words and Metaverse...
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Visual Arena Lindholmspiren 3, Gothenburg
Gradient, rosa och mörklila

Explore Virtual Worlds Event Series Final Event

Join us for this event series where we will explore the best virtual words and Metaverse...