Give a presentation (15-20 mins) on an academic paper from the IEEE Information Visualization (InfoVis) or Visual Analytics (VAST) conferences. These are top-tier conferences in the information visualization and visual analytics fields.
These will be scheduled between March 9-30 with 2 presentations per class meeting.
Paper selection and scheduling will be done through Piazza in the "presentation" folder. See the "Suggested Papers" post for a list of suggested papers, but you may request approval to present any other IEEE VIS paper. See the "Paper Selection" thread for information on how to register your selection. Once all papers have been chosen, we'll start scheduling the presentations in a similar manner. All papers must be selected by Fri, Feb 19.
You may send me a draft of your slides for early feedback. The draft is due the Thursday before your scheduled presentation date. I will not be able to look at drafts sent after that time.
Submission: Before class time on the day of your presentation, you must submit your slides via Blackboard (either upload the slides or post a link if they're in Google Slides). See Assignments > Academic Paper Presentation
I would prefer for all students to deliver their presentations live in Zoom. If you are not able to attend on your scheduled presentation date, then you may pre-record your presentation -- but this must be approved by me ahead of time. Before class time on the day of your scheduled presentation, submit both your slides and a link to the recording (don't try to attach the actual video file) on Blackboard.
The goal of the presentation is to teach us about the paper. To do this, you must be able to identify and understand the main points of the paper and present them in a clear manner.
Don't wait until the last minute to start preparing this. If the paper is about something that is not familiar to you, you may need to do some outside research on the topic. Odds are, if the topic is unfamiliar to you, it is also unfamiliar to your classmates. You should include enough background information in your presentation so that everyone can understand the main points of the paper.
Here are some questions that you should answer in your presentation:
- What is the motivation, or the problem that the authors are addressing?
- What is the authors' approach?
- Was there an evaluation? If so, describe it briefly. What were the results?
- What are the contributions of the work?
- What are the 3-5 main points that the authors want readers to remember from their paper?
Some papers may have an associated 30-second video (for example, see the VIS 2019 30-second Videos). These might be good to incorporate into your presentation, especially if the paper is describing an interactive system. (Do not show a video just because one exists -- it must be helpful for the presentation.)
This assignment is worth 25% of your final grade. The main portions of the grade are further explained below.
Your goal is to teach the class about the contributions and main points of the paper. You should also be prepared to answer some basic questions about the paper.
Your grade will largely be based on how well you demonstrate understanding of the paper and convey the main points to the class in the time limit.
You may use Google Slides, PowerPoint, or something that generates PDF to create your slides.
Slides must be your own work! You may find the authors' slides online. While these may be helpful to look at, you are not allowed to copy them. (If there are figures from the paper or presentation that would be helpful in your presentation, you may use them, but you must include an acknowledgement on the slide.) The main goal of this assignment is for you to summarize the paper and teach it to the class. This means that you must organize and develop the slides yourself.
If you want to provide references to other papers or other resources (images, examples, etc.), put the reference in small font (10-11pt) on the slide itself. Do not include a separate References slide at the end of your presentation.
Your slides should have a non-distracting theme, be free of misspellings and grammatical errors, be consistent in use of slide titles and capitalization, and should not contain too much text per slide. Use figures whenever possible ("a picture is worth a thousand words"), but do not add unnecessary clipart images.
Your title slide must contain the following information:
- Title of paper
- Authors
- Venue (conference)
- Year of publication
- CS 725/825 - Information Visualization
- Presented by your name
- Date
Make sure that you include slide numbers on all of your slides (except the title slide).
You must have a conclusion slide that provides a summary of the main points of the paper and brings the presentation to a natural end.
Here's what I expect in terms of the actual delivery of the presentation:
- Speak clearly and at an appropriate volume and speed
- Try to maintain eye contact with the audience (look at your camera)
- Demonstrate that you are prepared and have practiced the talk
- Use the slides as guides, but do not read directly from them or directly from your notes
- Ensure that transitions between topics are smooth and natural
- The presentation must have a natural ending to avoid ending with something like "That's all I have"
Students who are not presenting also have responsibilities.
-
Attention: Please turn your video on so that the speaker can see that you are paying attention and gauge your response during the talk. If you must turn off your video, make sure that you have a picture set up so that it's not just a blank box.
-
Presentation Feedback: There will be a thread for each presentation in the "presentation" folder in Piazza. Each non-presenting student must provide some constructive feedback for the speaker on their presentation. Ideally, this should contain at least 2 positive points and 2 suggestions for improvement. All feedback must be constructive in nature and be provided in a spirit of helping the presenter improve their presentation skills for the future. This thread can also be used for additional questions or discussion about the content of the paper after class.