How to use Animations in Tableau 2020.1

0:00In Tableau 2020.1, Tableau have added the

0:06ability to add animated Mark transitions.

0:10This is a really important feature because

0:12it fundamentally changes the way in which

0:14authors need to think about how interact

0:16ivity works on their dashboards.

0:19In order to show you the range of options,

0:21let's just jump straight into Tableau.

0:24You'll see in this workbook I have three

0:26sheets.

0:27The first one is a bar graph, the second is

0:30a simple line chart showing sales over time

0:34,

0:34and the last one is a scatter plot.

0:36What I want to do is show you the different

0:39behaviors that you get when you enable

0:41animations.

0:42Now I'm just going to simply change the

0:44sort on this and you can see that this is

0:45the standard

0:46behavior that we've been used to up until

0:48the latest version of Tableau.

0:50You just get this almost instant behavior

0:52when you sort or when you change the

0:54ordering

0:55on any particular dashboard.

0:57If I bring in the filtering capability here

0:59on the right hand side and I remove

1:01something,

1:02you'll see that it instantly appears and

1:05disappears.

1:06If we enable those back in, they come back

1:09in almost instantaneously.

1:11In order to enable Mark transitions, you

1:13just need to go over to the Format tab at

1:15the very

1:16top and then down to Animations.

1:18When you click on that, it opens up a pane

1:21here on the left hand side.

1:24You can see here that on this particular

1:26workbook, the default is off.

1:28But certain charts will have a different

1:30default.

1:31Just bear in mind that you check that

1:32behavior if you want to make sure that

1:33these are either

1:34on or off.

1:36I'm going to switch them on across the

1:38entire workbook.

1:39And now I'm going to go back to the sorting

1:41capability you saw me do earlier on.

1:43And now notice that as I do this, the

1:46behavior changes.

1:47There's now an animation that's applied to

1:49this effect.

1:50It's a very nice addition and it makes this

1:53slightly smoother and sort of nicer

1:55aesthetic

1:56to your charts if you're visualizing or

1:58interacting with them.

1:59To go deeper into the settings, you can

2:02change the duration of a particular

2:04animation.

2:04You can set it to one second.

2:07But notice this adds a little bit of lag to

2:09the interactivity.

2:10So if you set it to something like two

2:12seconds, just be aware that your users

2:14might not be

2:15comfortable waiting too long for something

2:17they used to get almost instantaneously.

2:20The last thing to bear in mind is you can

2:22also set a custom duration.

2:23If I set this to ten seconds, you might

2:26actually have instances where maybe you

2:27want to narrate

2:28something and this would be a perfect

2:31transition sort of duration.

2:33Because what you can do is you can narrate

2:34a discussion or a particular point whilst

2:36it's animating in the background.

2:38And that just allows you to have sort of

2:40slightly better interaction with your

2:42audience.

2:42You can see that happening here in very,

2:45very, very slow motion.

2:47Now the last thing to bear in mind is the

2:50style of the animation that you've got here

2:53.

2:53I'm going to set this back to 30 seconds,

2:56maybe actually one second so you can just

2:58see this a little bit better emphasized.

3:00And if I just filter out art, for example,

3:03you'll see here that everything happens

3:06simultaneously.

3:07The item is removed and then all the

3:10remaining subcategories sort of move up to

3:13fill the

3:13space.

3:14If I set it to a little bit slower here and

3:17we do the same thing for, let's go for

3:19chairs

3:20here in the middle.

3:21Let's just do that.

3:22Let's remove that.

3:23You'll see that a bunch of different

3:24animations happen all at the same time.

3:27They all sort of start at the same time.

3:29That's the key meaning of this style

3:32simultaneous.

3:34If I change this to sequential, what Table

3:36au will do is it will do each of those

3:38behaviors

3:38one after the other.

3:40So let me add chairs back in.

3:42It will first add chairs back into the mix

3:45and then it will animate that back into the

3:48mix.

3:49So you get this sort of slightly staggered

3:50behavior.

3:51And again, this allows you to maybe

3:53emphasize a particular point or emphasize a

3:56particular

3:57behavior.

3:58But fundamentally, you've just got to be

4:00aware of these sort of subtleties because

4:02they can

4:02actually help the way you talk about your

4:04visualization to others if you're maybe

4:06showing

4:07your visualization.

4:08I still think if you're using a dashboard

4:10in its traditional sense, you're probably

4:12going to have these set to the fastest

4:14setting and you're probably going to try

4:16and minimize

4:17sort of too much animation on the page

4:19because some people suffer from motion

4:21sickness and

4:22so you don't want this to become some sort

4:24of all singing and dancing sort of circus

4:26show.

4:27So really think wisely about your

4:29selections when you use animations.

4:32The other thing to bear in mind is you can

4:34actually set sheet specific animation

4:36defaults.

4:37So you can see here all the defaults that I

4:39was working with before were across the

4:42entire workbook.

4:43That's sort of signified here at the top by

4:46this section.

4:47But I can actually change the behavior just

4:49for this particular worksheet.

4:50I can even switch it off and I can set a

4:52slightly different style on this particular

4:55worksheet

4:56in order to bring it together in a

4:58dashboard.

4:59Now let's switch over to this chart here

5:01where we have dates.

5:02I'm showing dates and sales.

5:05Dates on columns and on rows I've got sales

5:07and I'm basically just showing sales over

5:09time.

5:10What I'm going to do is I'm going to bring

5:12in the filter option again and I'm going to

5:14leave everything as it is.

5:16And we're going to go to the format option

5:18and enable animations once again on this

5:21particular

5:21sheet.

5:22You can see it's set to one second.

5:24If I filter out art, you can see the line

5:26animates.

5:27But in this particular case, notice that it

5:29's slightly harder to see because all that

5:31seems

5:31to happen is that the axis moves up and

5:33down.

5:34But the general shape of the data remains

5:36broadly the same.

5:37If we take out a slightly bigger category

5:39like chairs, you can see this actually

5:41starts

5:42to happen a little bit more.

5:44But fundamentally because the only thing

5:46that I'm taking out isn't actually sort of

5:48meaningfully

5:49changing the values in each year, I'm

5:51actually not noticing any change here.

5:53So you have to bear in mind that whatever

5:55you select needs to animate in a way that

5:57means that there's a meaningful difference

5:59when someone looks at it on the screen

6:01other

6:02than just the axis changing because

6:03otherwise it's really difficult to see how

6:06the patterns

6:06and so on are changing.

6:08If I change this to be colored by category,

6:11you can see now that that difference is

6:15much,

6:15much more pronounced.

6:17So you can see here I've got the three

6:18different lines.

6:19And by bringing in that option, you can see

6:22that line was animated in and then back out

6:25again.

6:26Okay?

6:27Now if I remove a particular item, let's

6:29say for chairs, which should affect the

6:31blue line,

6:32you can see that that line drops down.

6:34If I add that back in, it drops back to

6:36where it was.

6:38Now if I add sort of more detail to this by

6:40taking out the quarters, let's bring this

6:43to a continuous year, and then let's add

6:46sort of more context to this.

6:48Now as we filter out items, you'll see that

6:51this chart animates in a much, much more

6:53interesting

6:54way.

6:55And this animation starts to tell a story

6:57about where things are coming from and

6:59where

6:59they're heading and then what's happening

7:02in between those particular stages.

7:04That's the key thing here.

7:05You're helping people notice there's some

7:08sort of journey between one point and

7:10another

7:10point.

7:11That's the whole point of animations.

7:13If I go to a scatter plot in this

7:15particular case, you can see here that I've

7:17got a simple

7:17date filter here across the top on the

7:20right hand side.

7:21And what you'll see here is as I change

7:23these dates, you'll see these bubbles sort

7:25of change

7:26positions and change how they work.

7:28But here, I haven't actually set animations

7:31.

7:31So let's go back in.

7:32Let's go to format, animations, and let's

7:36make sure this is on by default.

7:39The key thing I want to make sure here is

7:41that I actually change this filter in a way

7:43that allows someone to sort of notice what

7:45's going on.

7:46And you can see here now because the change

7:48is sort of bigger and more accentuated, you

7:51can actually see where the circles are

7:52coming from and where they're going to.

7:55And so what you can actually start to do

7:56here is you can actually start to animate

7:58this

7:59in a sort of a very, very interesting way.

8:02So what I'm going to do now is I'm going to

8:03do something slightly different, which is

8:05I'm going to change this order date here to

8:08the week number.

8:09I'm going to just click OK on that.

8:11And then I'm going to drag that up to the

8:13page itself.

8:14What this allows me to do is sort of step

8:16through each of the different weeks.

8:18And you can see here that it's animating

8:20the change.

8:21However, what I'm trying to do is recreate

8:23that sort of effect that you saw in Hans

8:25Rosling's

8:25sort of demonstration of sort of world

8:28economic indicators.

8:30And so in order to do this, I actually need

8:32to set these values to become running

8:34totals.

8:35So let's set this to a running total.

8:37And I need to make sure that this is

8:39computing using the order date.

8:42I wanted to add up the cells over time.

8:44So I need to make sure that it's using the

8:47running total and then it's using order

8:49date

8:50as the computation.

8:52And I need to do that also with this item

8:54here, which shows the sum of cells over

8:56time

8:56as a size.

8:57Again, do the running total.

9:00And I need to make sure that we set that to

9:03order date.

9:05And again, on this aggregation ratio,

9:07because I want this effect to be consistent

9:10over time,

9:10I need to make sure that I'm doing this

9:13consistently across all the values.

9:15So now you can see here that all the items

9:19here on the very first week start out tiny.

9:23And I'm going to animate this very, very

9:24quickly.

9:25I'm going to hit start now.

9:26But what I'll do is I'll stop talking and

9:28you'll actually see this animate through

9:30time.

9:31And I'll speed it up so you can see the net

9:33effect that you'd get if you maybe record

9:35this as a video or if you were to handle it

9:54as an oration.

10:02So you can see how this effect works.

10:05And it's a really, really handy feature.

10:07Now one thing to bear in mind is that you

10:09've got to be careful what animation choices

10:11you've

10:11used.

10:12I've already mentioned this.

10:13But also you have to bear in mind that if

10:15you're relying on animations, you have to

10:17bear in mind that the user might not

10:19actually see those animations.

10:21The individual user on Tableau Server gets

10:23the ability to switch off animations in

10:26their

10:26own account settings.

10:28Let me just show you that interface now.

10:30So I'm here on Tableau Online but a Tableau

10:32Server instance would have a very similar

10:35sort of interface.

10:36And over in the top right hand side I can

10:38go to my own account settings.

10:40And that opens this particular window that

10:42you see here.

10:43And at the very, very bottom you'll see

10:46here that this animation settings is over

10:48here.

10:48And actually as a user I can unbulk and

10:51disable that.

10:52And when I hit those changes it doesn't

10:54matter if you as an author have enabled

10:57animations.

10:58That specific user won't see those

10:59animations.

11:00So don't rely on those features if you're

11:03building a dashboard just yet because not

11:05everyone will see those changes if they

11:08have this particular setting enabled.

11:10The second thing is that Tableau Server

11:12admins themselves don't currently

11:14understand the

11:14impact of animations on their Tableau

11:17Server.

11:18And so they may also disable animations

11:20across the entire Tableau Server until they

11:23have

11:23a better handle on what performance impact

11:25that might have.

11:26So those are just two words of caution.

11:29Now that said, I want to point you to two

11:32bits of awesome content created by the

11:34Tableau

11:35community.

11:36In this particular case Mark Reed has done

11:38an absolutely brilliant job summarizing the

11:41new features in Tableau in a lot more

11:43detail than I've gone into in this video.

11:46It's a really sort of good historical

11:47journey of where animations can really add

11:50value.

11:50He mentions the example that Hans Rosling

11:53is most famously sort of known for.

11:55But he also talks a bit about how the

11:58implementation works in Tableau.

12:00And to finish the piece off, he's got his

12:02very own video here which you can watch on

12:05his channel.

12:06I'll put a link in the description below.

12:07But I'll also put it in the information tip

12:10that's coming across the screen now.

12:13He's actually simulated the Hans Rosling

12:15example in a Tableau workbook with some

12:18very, very

12:18nice actions enabled as well.

12:21So you can really start to see how this

12:24really starts to come to life in Tableau.

12:27It's a feature that's never really been

12:28possible before.

12:29But if you put together the right sort of

12:32story and background, then everything

12:34starts

12:34to fall into place.

12:36If you've enjoyed this video, hit like.

12:38If not, drop us a comment below and let us

12:40know what kind of content you'd like to see

12:43in the future.

12:43One by one.

12:44That one is done now.