# Iron Viz (2022) reaction Livestream - Tableau Conference 2022

> This is content from just-tim, the data-and-analytics channel by Tim Ngwena (formerly 'Tableau Tim'). Tim has 12+ years of hands-on BI experience and covers Tableau most of all, plus Power BI, Looker, Hex, SQL and data modelling, the analytics industry, and the craft of doing the job — always tool-agnostic and honest about the trade-offs.

- **Author:** Tim Ngwena (just-tim, https://just-tim.com/about)
- **Published:** 2022-05-10
- **Format:** Video · 1 min read · transcript available
- **Topics:** Data visualisation, Community, Industry trends
- **Tools:** Tableau (animations, maps, parameters, prep, public)
- **Canonical:** https://just-tim.com/posts/iron-viz-2022-reaction-livestream-tableau-conference-2022
- **Watch:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ic9v8MLe6DI

Andre and I co-hosted a livestream reacting to the Iron Viz 2022 finals at Tableau Conference. We toured the virtual Viz Gallery to break down the three finalists' qualifier vizzes, chatted with our global audience, then watched and commentated on CJ Mays, Kimberly Scott and Will Sutton build their visualisations live on stage.

## Key takeaways

- The Tableau Conference virtual Viz Gallery is worth exploring, with a dedicated room for the Iron Viz finalists where each viz links straight through to Tableau Public for editing in the browser.
- Keeping old vizzes on your Tableau Public profile shows your progression over time, so don't delete early work that documents your learning journey.
- Finalists pushed Tableau's features creatively: violin charts for before/after distributions, map layers used unconventionally for small multiples, makepoint calculations for custom maps, and parameters used to store interactive state within a session.
- Will Sutton's interactive 'Interpreting Art' qualifier uses a parameter as a pseudo-database to capture responses, and a vertical Sankey to guide the reader down the narrative.
- Animation in Iron Viz works best for time sequences; used unwisely it pulls attention at the wrong moment and distracts from the story.

## Chapters

- 0:00 Going live and checking the streams
- 1:05 Touring the virtual Viz Gallery
- 2:46 CJ Mays' Diary of a CEO viz
- 5:43 Will Sutton's Interpreting Art viz
- 9:14 Kimberly Scott's Archibald Prize viz
- 11:30 Audience chat and why we watch Iron Viz
- 18:21 How Iron Viz could evolve
- 23:56 The finals begin and contestant intros
- 39:34 Sous-visors and judges introduced
- 43:20 Live build commentary
- 61:51 CJ's final presentation

Watch the full video, read the transcript and use chapter deep-links on the page: https://just-tim.com/posts/iron-viz-2022-reaction-livestream-tableau-conference-2022

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just-tim — Data and analytics, with a point of view. · https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7HYxRWmaNlJux-X7rNLZyw · https://twitter.com/TableauTim · https://www.linkedin.com/in/timngwena