Eurographics Workshop on Visual Computing for Biology and Medicine (2021) S. Oeltze-Jafra, N. N. Smit, and B. Sommer (Editors) An Exploration of Practice and Preferences for the Visual Communication of Biomedical Processes L. Garrison 1,2 , M. Meuschke 3 , J. Fairman 4 , N.N. Smit 1,2 , B. Preim 3 , and S. Bruckner 1,2 1 Dept. of Informatics, Univ. of Bergen, Norway, 2 Mohn Medical Imaging and Visualization Centre, Haukeland Univ. Hospital, Norway, 3 Institute for Simulation and Graphics, Otto-von-Guericke Univ., Germany, 4 Dept. of Art as Applied to Medicine, Johns Hopkins Univ., USA Abstract The visual communication of biomedical processes draws from diverse techniques in both visualization and biomedical illustra- tion. However, matching these techniques to their intended audience often relies on practice-based heuristics or narrow-scope evaluations. We present an exploratory study of the criteria that audiences use when evaluating a biomedical process visualiza- tion targeted for communication. Designed over a series of expert interviews and focus groups, our study focuses on common communication scenarios of five well-known biomedical processes and their standard visual representations. We framed these scenarios in a survey with participant expertise spanning from minimal to expert knowledge of a given topic. Our results show frequent overlap in abstraction preferences between expert and non-expert audiences, with similar prioritization of clarity and the ability of an asset to meet a given communication objective. We also found that some illustrative conventions are not as clear as we thought, e.g., glows have broadly ambiguous meaning, while other approaches were unexpectedly preferred, e.g., biomedical illustrations in place of data-driven visualizations. Our findings suggest numerous opportunities for the continued convergence of visualization and biomedical illustration techniques for targeted visualization design. CCS Concepts • Human-centered computing → Visualization design and evaluation methods; Scientific visualization; Visualization theory, concepts and paradigms; • Computer Applications → Life and Medical Sciences; 1. Introduction New technologies exposing novel aspects of science and medicine have increased demand for visual methods and tools for both ex- perts [NI19] and non-experts. While numerous visualization works have been inspired by biomedical illustration [RBGV08], the de- mand for science communication has driven an increasing con- vergence of these two respective disciplines. For example, Cell- Blender [SVB*96; SB*01; KBK*08], a molecular simulation plu- gin for Blender [Com18], can be used by both biomedical illus- trators and visualization scientists for analysis and communica- tion. Along with this increased demand for new visualizations and tools comes a need to understand their utility for different audience types. Differing values between audience types were apparent at the 2020 VCBM Workshop Image Competition, where the contest winner as selected by a jury of biomedical illustrators received one of the lowest rankings according to conference attendee popular choice. The two audiences clearly evaluated and prioritized differ- ent aspects of the visualizations in the competition. As a whole, our community lacks a clear understanding of the rationale behind differing audience preferences, and similarly lacks a complete view of the various scientific and illustrative techniques used to visualize biomedical processes. Our goal is to gain insights into how visualization and biomedi- cal illustration techniques are used and assessed by differing audi- ences for visual communication. In an interdisciplinary approach with biomedical illustrators and visualization scientists we ex- plored the similarities, as well as differences, in common ap- proaches to visualize biomedical processes. From this study we identify opportunities for further growth and convergence of tech- niques. The five topics we surveyed (signal transduction, consti- tutive activation, blood flow, aneurysm, and metastasis) span the micro- to macroscale and include patho- and physiological pro- cesses to serve as a proxy for the large space of representations of biomedical processes. For each topic, communication scenarios and assets are designed in conjunction with expert focus groups. This approach controls the design space while providing important in-depth insights on discipline-dependent visualization practices. Specifically this study contributes: • Insights into the design considerations necessary to develop materials for communication of biomedical processes from both a visualization and biomedical illustration pipeline. • Curated assets demonstrating typical techniques used to depict five common biomedical processes. • A qualitative survey involving participants with diverse and © 2021 The Author(s) Eurographics Proceedings © 2021 The Eurographics Association.