Hi Reader,
​
I’ve always loved making data visualizations. Partly because they look cool. But mostly because they make data and insights easy for anyone to understand.

The problem? Coding up a visualization - or even better, an interactive, self-explanatory data story you can share - takes a ton of time.

Recently, I had a lightbulb moment: What if I tried AI coding agents to build scrollytelling visualization apps? 🤔

If you’re not familiar with the term, scrollytelling is a web design technique that uses scroll-triggered animations, transitions, and interactions to turn a dataset into an immersive story. You’ve probably seen examples in places like the New York Times, The Pudding, or Bloomberg.

So I gave it a shot. I used Cursor to build a scrollytelling piece on AI’s environmental footprint, using d3.js (a powerful JavaScript data visualization package).

Let’s just say… the first attempts were a mess. Lots of trial and error, and nothing remotely usable at first.

After wrestling with it for a while, here’s what I learned:

• Coding agents don’t understand storytelling: If you just throw them a bunch of data files, and pray for magic 🪄. You have to provide the insights and structure.
• They might “hallucinate” data: Sometimes they even modify your files. Be crystal clear that the data is read-only.
• Detailed instructions are everything: The more explicit you are about tools, frameworks, story flow, and acceptance criteria, the better the results. I used ChatGPT to help me crafted a pretty detailed "build brief" for Cursor, which works pretty well.

So here's my battle-tested workflow for using AI coding agents to build scrollytelling apps (visual created with Claude Artifacts):

The first output will almost never be perfect. In my case, it took 5 - 10 more prompt iterations (Step 5 in my workflow) before I had something I felt good about.

I've seen some people got really enthusiastic about the potential of this use case, and what this can mean for their businesses:

And I just made a new video walking you through the whole experiment:

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Let me know if you find this helpful!

Wishing you a great week ahead,

Thu 🤗

✨ P.S.: Work with me

If you want to learn how to code, build AI applications from the ground up, and actually understand what’s happening under the hood - I’ve built a program that guides you through all the fundamentals of Python, Machine Learning, and AI.

You’ll join a community of 350+ learners learning to build AI projects, supporting each other, and getting direct access to me along the way.

Wishing you a wonderful week,

Thu 🤗