08 · Research
Reminiscing the Legendary P. Ramlee through Data Visualization Technique
Jawaheer Jaffar, Nur Afiqah Ahmad Norazizi, Nasiroh Omar, Sharifah Aliman & Suraya Masrom
Jaffar, J., Ahmad Norazizi, N. A., Omar, N., Aliman, S., & Masrom, S. (2020). Reminiscing the legendary P. Ramlee through data visualization technique. Mathematical Sciences and Informatics Journal, 1(2), 59–69. https://doi.org/10.24191/mij.v1i2.14187
Most of the research on P. Ramlee’s works focused on musical, cultural, historical and social perspectives. There is a lack of research that analysed the legendary P. Ramlee’s performance from the perspective of computer scientists, particularly through the use of data visualisation techniques. Using data visualisation techniques, this paper aims to quantitatively highlight his accomplishments and gain insights into his legendary contributions in terms of patterns and trends.
Methodology
This study utilises Andy Kirk’s data visualisation processes and techniques that are widely used in many fields. The work divides the processes into two parts: the hidden thinking and the development of design solution. The ‘hidden thinking’ stages described in this paper are formulating the brief and working with data. The development of design solution includes data representation, interactivity, annotation, colour and composition.
Two scenarios were determined during ‘brief formulation’: firstly, to present the accomplishments of P. Ramlee to Malaysians through the research perspective, and secondly, to pay tribute to a P. Ramlee narrative for The P. Ramlee Memorial, Kuala Lumpur. All visualisations were designed around three ‘curiosities’:
- What is the total number of films cast, directed, and written by P. Ramlee?
- What are the songs composed and sung by P. Ramlee?
- What are the awards and honours given to P. Ramlee?
Four phases in data acquisition and processing
The four phases: data acquisition, data review, data transformation and data exploration
Songs sung by Saloma; duets with P. Ramlee; his awards and honours, shown on mouse-over (1963)
Conclusion
The main contribution of this work is the design and development of interactive visualisation of information from the unstructured data of the legendary P. Ramlee. This project provides fundamental knowledge to the design and implementation of interactive and dynamic visualisation for different domains of data, including big data analytics.