By encoding semantic relations into relative positions, word clouds have shown the capability to deliver richer messages than purely visualizing word frequencies. Existing studies mainly focus on layout algorithms that cluster related words, preserve temporal coherence, and optimize spatial shapes. However, they cannot fully convey multiple relations among words and their evolvement through relative positions and static representations. In this paper, we explore animated word clouds that take advantage of storytelling strategies to present interactions between words and show the dynamic process of content changes, thus communicating the underlying stories. We initially create several exemplars of animated word clouds with designers through a structured iterative design process. These exemplars lead to a preliminary design space that distills essential narrative elements with design choices. Based on the design space, we develop a prototype tool, DancingWords, which provides story-oriented interactions and automatic layouts for users to generate animated word clouds. We evaluate the expressiveness and usefulness of our system through several example animated stories and a usability study with general users. The results show that DancingWords allows users to produce appealing storytelling videos easily and quickly for communication.

中文翻译：

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DancingWords：探索动画词云讲故事

通过将语义关系编码到相对位置，词云显示出比纯粹可视化词频更丰富的信息的能力。现有的研究主要集中在聚类相关词、保持时间连贯性和优化空间形状的布局算法上。然而，它们不能通过相对位置和静态表示来完整地表达单词之间的多重关系及其演变。在本文中，我们探索了动画词云，它利用讲故事的策略来呈现词之间的相互作用并展示内容变化的动态过程，从而传达潜在的故事。我们最初通过结构化的迭代设计过程与设计师一起创建了几个动画词云示例。这些范例通向一个初步设计空间，该空间通过设计选择提炼出基本的叙事元素。基于设计空间，我们开发了原型工具DancingWords，它为用户提供了面向故事的交互和自动布局，以生成动画词云。我们通过几个示例动画故事和对一般用户的可用性研究来评估我们系统的表现力和实用性。结果表明，DancingWords 允许用户轻松快速地制作吸引人的讲故事视频以进行交流。我们通过几个示例动画故事和对一般用户的可用性研究来评估我们系统的表现力和实用性。结果表明，DancingWords 允许用户轻松快速地制作吸引人的讲故事视频以进行交流。我们通过几个示例动画故事和对一般用户的可用性研究来评估我们系统的表现力和实用性。结果表明，DancingWords 允许用户轻松快速地制作吸引人的讲故事视频以进行交流。