Weather Graphics Products

[KevOwensby]

Thought this was an interesting read from TVNewsCheck on what different companies will be presenting this year.

"Vendors of the competitive and fast changing weather graphics market will be out in force next month at the NAB Show. In many cases, the new products and features they will be promoting were developed in direct response to customer, and even audience, research."

http://www.tvnewscheck.com/article/2012/03/28/58383/stations-viewers-inspire-weather-offerings/page/1

[Donovan]

I really like the way graphics are becoming more and more advanced now. It's hard to display weather stories sometimes and tools like these really do give your station an edge with all the new technology. I wonder what this means for TWC? They may already have Max 3.0 since WSI is a company of TWC.

[Eric]

It's very important to balance visual attractiveness with the usefulness of the information provided.

A given map may look very pretty, but it's essentially eye candy: it conveys little to no practical or useful information, but impresses the viewers at home so much anyway because it's in pretend 3-D, or spins around a lot, or has lots of animation, or shows something in a very different way.

Displaying weather information doesn't have to be done in a boring way, but neither does the information have to be obscured to show off the computing power of the latest equipment the TV station bought.

[Donovan]

I agree Eric. TWC recently adding the falling 3-D rain drops, snow flakes, and lightning bolts are over the top. They obscure some of the base precip layers to the point in the Western US that you cannot see the details.