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10 thoughts on data visualization best practices and tools:
1) For interactive visualizations of data on 3D globes, I use a mix of C++, Python (for data cleaning), and Unreal Engine (with a plugin called Cesium). An example of this is at https://youtu.be/9i-tQ8Sr80o.
2) If I am trying to put together a 3D globe that has less quality but that can be accessed by the web, I use Mapbox GL JS, D3.js, and React. An example of this is at https://www.whiteowleducation.com/blog/2022/10/14/real-estat....
3) I have seen others use Three.js for developing 3D data visualizations on the web. An example of this in a data science context is at https://blog.fastforwardlabs.com/2019/04/29/visualizing-acti....
4) If you are trying to do 3D population density maps in R, there are a lot in the community that say you should use https://www.rayshader.com/ with R.
5) If you are really trying to push the limits of data visualization, follow https://twitter.com/Arti_AR_video . He is doing data vis in AR. Robert Scoble had a good tweet the other day (https://twitter.com/Scobleizer/status/1620498790653501440?) showing Arti with 3D bar charts sitting on a table.
6) If you are doing data vis for urban planning, odds are they are already using ArcGIS, and odds are you will be using something like that.
7) If you are trying to do data vis that relates to architecture, I would actually suggest starting with Twinmotion (which is part of the Unreal Engine ecosystem).
8) If you are trying to do data vis for simulations, it may be worth looking at https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/omniverse/ .
9) If you are wanting to show some high end maps fast, use Geolayers 3. There is a YouTube channel called "Boone Loves Video" (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXyGw2OkrAzLhq1r7hyDZkA). Boone explains Geolayers often in his videos.
10) I personally believe that if you are trying to get to next-gen data visualization my best guess is that you would use a mix of Blender, Nuke, Houdini, or After Effects. I personally have only used Blender and After Effects so far.
Also, if you have any data visualization needs, I am currently on the job market. https://www.linkedin.com/in/ralphbrooks has details about me.
Nowadays, there's lots of tooling around for nested data, like roomba [1] or the list-column workflow enabled by purrr and dplyr [2].
[1] https://github.com/cstawitz/roomba