ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the communication value of visuals and the situations when engineers do well to use them. It discusses the most common types of graphical presentations in technical writing and presents guidelines for producing accurate and attractive visuals and for integrating them into the text. A visual in the text is a bit like a billboard along the highway: if properly designed, its core idea is understood at a glance. Of course, quick comprehension is desirable in most communication tasks. In addition, visuals allow the writer to condense a great deal of information into compact form. Rather than wasting space, visuals in many cases save space. Tables are used to present large amounts of data and to give absolute values where precision is important. Line graphs are used to show trends and relationships. They show well continuity and direction in one or more variables.
