Tell your story through data
Everyone has a story. Not everyone has the data to back it up. DataMade specializes in creating persuasive, data-driven narratives and exploration tools.
DataMade has over a decade of experience in research and discovery, creating online maps, visualizations and APIs, and performing data analysis and modeling to make your data tell a compelling story. See a full list of our services.
Our work
Los Angeles Metro Councilmatic
Data processing and presentation, user research, map visualization
Client: Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority
An open government tool for understanding and tracking the activity of the Board Members of the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
Justice Divided
Data processing, analysis and presentation, map visualization
Client: Illinois Justice Project, Adler University, Project NIA
An educational tool and data repository for promoting awareness of disproportionate minority contact, or the overrepresentation of black youth in the juvenile justice system.
Security Force Monitor
Content Management System (CMS), data modeling, user research
Client: Columbia Law School Human Rights Institute
A system for compiling public information on security forces with a goal of aiding journalists, human rights groups, litigators and others to hold security forces accountable.
Neighborhood Opportunity Fund
User-centered process design, map visualization
Client: SomerCor
A website to help property owners in underserved neighborhoods access block grants for economic development.
Retail Thrive Zones
User-centered process design, custom charting, map visualization
Client: SomerCor
A web portal that makes it easy for businesses in low-income neighborhoods to apply for tax breaks — with an interactive map, dynamic charts, and an easy-to-use application form.
Living With Lead
Data processing, analysis and presentation
Client: City Bureau
Liberation and statistical treatment of data on lead in Chicago’s schools and parks from more than 500 PDFs.
Impact of the 606
Data visualization
Client: Institute for Housing Studies at DePaul University
Interactive maps and charts that measure change in the housing market near Chicago’s 606 linear park.
The Openness Project
Campaign finance access, custom charting
Client: New Mexico In Depth
Search and browse all political contributions, expenditures, and candidates in statewide and local New Mexico races.
MyReps
Client: Participatory Budgeting Project
Enter your address to find your local elected representatives and then tell them to support participatory budgeting!
2nd City Zoning
Data visualization
Client: Pro bono
An interactive map that lets you find out how your building is zoned and explore zoning patterns throughout the city
Where the Work Is
Data visualization
Client: JPMorgan Chase, IPPR, Burning Glass
An interactive visualization for exploring entry-level job dynamics for middle-skilled jobs in the United Kingdom.
Big Easy Budget
Product deployment, data visualization
Client: Committee for a Better New Orleans
An explorable budget for the City of New Orleans to make government more transparent and accountable.
Lascaux
Printing, maps
Client: LISC Chicago
Print high resolution data maps from the web
Chicago Councilmatic
Data processing and presentation, user research
Client: Sunlight Foundation
An open government tool for tracking the legislation, committees, meetings and aldermen of the Chicago City Council.
ClearStreets
Data processing and algorithms, data mapping
Client: Pro bono
A civic app for tracking where Chicago snow plows have gone during a snowstorm.
Macoupin Directory
Product deployment, searchable map, government services
Client: Macoupin County, IL
A searchable map and directory for finding businesses, local governments and community services in Macoupin County, IL
Invest in West Virginia Families
GIS data merging, web and information design
Client: West Virginia Center on Budget & Policy
We showed how a proposed Earned Income Tax Credit increase would affect constituents in each state district in West Virginia.
Citizens Police Data Project
Data analysis, consulting and visualization
Client: Invisible Institute
We helped analyze 56,000 misconduct complaint records from the Chicago Police Department.
Brentano Elementary
Information design, custom website, code training
Client: Friends of Brentano
An open source and responsive website for a local neighborhood school, managed by the students.
NYC Councilmatic
Data processing and presentation, user research
Client: Participatory Politics Foundation
An open government tool for understanding and tracking what’s happening in New York City Council.
Illinois Sunshine
Campaign finance access, custom charting
Client: Illinois Campaign for Political Reform
Search, browse and download over 20 years of searchable campaign finance records in Illinois.
Chicago's Million Dollar Blocks
Custom charting and map visualization
Client: Pro bono
An interactive map showing spending on incarceration for every block in the City of Chicago.
New York Open Budget
Product deployment, government services
Client: State of New York
An explorable budget for the State of New York to make government more transparent and accountable.
Cook County House Price Index
Custom charting and map visualization
Client: DePaul Institute for Housing Studies
We communicated research about price trends for single-family homes in 33 submarkets in Cook County.
Parserator
APIs, data tools
A framework for making probabilistic parsers using natural language processing.
Entity-Focused Data System
De-duplication, distributed tasks, data linking
Client: Atlanta Journal Constitution
A data system to continually link information about political figures, campaign filings, contracts and lobbyist disclosures to drive investigations.
Geomancer
APIs, data tools
Client: Associated Press
A free and open source tool for journalists to easily mash up data based on shared geography.
Plenar.io
API development, data exploration, geospatial querying
Client: Urban Center for Computation and Data
We worked with researchers and policy students to build a new platform to explore and build with open data through space and time.
Election Money
Data scraping, documentation
To empower journalists and citizens to investigate money in Illinois politics, we partnered with the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform to package up and document 20 years of campaign contributions and expenditures from the Illinois State Board of Elections.
Cook County Housing Stock Composition
Custom mapping, TileMill training
Client: DePaul Institute for Housing Studies
We communicated research about the Chicago area housing market through an interactive map that earned national media attention.
Dangerous by Design - Pedestrian Fatalities Map
Mapping and user interface
Client: Smart Growth America
As part of Smart Growth America’s “Dangerous by Design” 2014 report on urban planning and pedestrian safety, we built an interactive map to search pedestrian fatalities in the US going back to 2003.
EITC Works!
GIS data merging, web and information design
Client: Voices for Illinois Children
We showed how a proposed Earned Income Tax Credit increase would affect constituents in each state district.
LargeLots.org
User centered process design, GIS data merging
Client: LISC Chicago
We worked with the City of Chicago and neighborhood groups to improve and scale up a program for selling land to residents.
Chicago Sun-Times Clout Meter
Data modeling, scraping, APIs
Client: Chicago Sun-Times
To quantify the power, or ‘clout’, in Chicago City Council, we partnered with the Chicago Sun-Times to model to rank the political influence for Chicago’s 50 Aldermen.
CrimeAround.us
Data visualization, APIs
Client: LISC Chicago
To make Chicago’s Crime data more immediate and useful for neighborhood organizations and residents, we built an online tool to search crime reports by custom geographies and filters.
Macoupin Budget
Product deployment, data release, government services
Client: Macoupin County, IL
An explorable County budget for Macoupin County, IL to make local goverment more transparent and accountable.
Chicago Health Atlas
Data visualizations, data transformation
Client: Smart Chicago Collaborative
We worked with the Smart Chicago Collaborative, Chicago Department of Health and Human Services, CHITREC and others to create a visual and comprehensive health data explorer for every neighborhood and zip code in Chicago.
State of Washington Budget
Product deployment and customization
Client: Economic Opportunity Institute
We helped the Economic Opportunity Institute, a policy and advocacy group in Washington State, customize and launch an explorable State budget visualization.
Connect Chicago
Interactive map, website design, data cleanup
Client: Smart Chicago Collaborative
To help bridge the digital skills gap in Chicago, we built a system with the Smart Chicago Collaborative for searching and managing a directory of free computer labs in the city.