Mapping all Formula 1 Grand Prix Races

In this post I’ll show you a data visualization showing all of the Formula 1 Grand Prix that have taken place over the years. I’ve built it in Looker Studio. You’ll be able to filter and view each race that’s taken place; from 1950’s British Grand Prix at Silverstone to the latest races in 2024….

How to make a Looker Studio Connection Map

In this blog post I’ll show you how to build a Connection Map in Looker Studio. A Connection Map is a type of Google Map in Looker Studio that allows you to map a line between two points on a map. The Looker Studio Connection Map Below is the Looker Studio Connection Map, it’s best…

Senegal 🇸🇳 Photographs

Here are some photographs taken in 2016 during a trip to Senegal. https://youtu.be/3PgAu1jOCqM?si=xGVITvu1Fn_4zRho My Other Blog Posts If you enjoyed this post about Senegal photographs you might enjoy my other blog posts.

Comparing DALL-E and Midjourney AI Images in 2024

I have previously compared DALL-E and Midjourney back in 2022, when the technology was still a bit rough and ready. Since both tools have come a long way, I figured it was worth comparing them again in the first quarter of 2024 to see how they stacked up. A bit about DALL-E and Midjourney Both…

Visualizing a young Africa and an aging World

In this post I’ll be looking at data showing a young Africa and an aging world. The charts are based on World Bank Indicators data/ I used Looker Studio to connect to the dataset in BigQuery and visualized it. Population aged 65 and above as a % of Total Population This map uses the WDI Indicator Population ages 65…

Visualizing Fertility Rates across the World

I’ve seen quite a few blogs and videos discussing declining fertility rates and the resulting population decline across the world, so I thought it would be interesting to explore some World Bank data on the topic. These visualizations are based on the Total Fertility Rate metric within the World Bank’s World Development Indicators public data…

GDP per Capita within African Regions

In this blog post I’ll explore GDP per capita within the regions of Africa. What is GDP per capita? GDP per capita is a measure that represents the average economic output per person in a country, calculated by dividing the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of a country by its population. Expressed often in current US…

Africa’s GDP Growth Over Time

I was interest in exploring some World Bank Indicators data to look at Africa’s changing GDP over time. So I used Looker Studio to connect to the dataset in BigQuery and visualized the data. What is GDP? GDP stands for Gross Domestic Product. It’s like the total scorecard of a country’s economy. Imagine you have…

Midjourney Evolution: Version 1 – Version 6

Wanted to show some examples showing the rapid advance of Midjourney in the past couple of years. According to this article by TechFinitive here are the release dates of previous Midjourney interations. VersionRelease Date1February 20222April 20223July 20224November 20225March 20236January 2024 Examples of different Midjourney Versions Let’s look at how each version of Midjourney would create…

The A to Z of Programmatic Advertising (ChatGPT)

There are a lot of different concepts and acronyms within programmatic advertising. I asked OpenAI’s AI-powered language model ChatGPT (Version 4) to list various concepts and terms related to programmatic advertising by letter of the alphabet. Enjoy! Ad Exchange: A technology platform that facilitates the buying and selling of media advertising inventory between advertisers and publishers….

ChatGPT explains Programmatic Advertising

The following post is a collection of answers ChatGPT has provided about Programmatic Advertising. Enjoy! Contents What is Progammatic Advertising?Key Components:Key Processes:Types of Programmatic Deals:Conclusion:What are some of the most important concepts to understand in Programmatic Advertising?What is Real-Time Bidding (RTB) ?What is a Demand-Side Platform (DSP)?How It Works:Key Features:Conclusion:What is a Supply-Side Platform (SSP)?How…

Testing out ChatGPT Code Interpreter

I just wanted to document my first interactions with ChatGPT’s new Code Interpreter. I used a data set from the Toronto Police Service Public Safety Data Portal. This is a screenshot of what the data looks like in the CSV file I downloaded. 1. Describing the Dataset itself I asked the Code Interpreter “Can you…

The Matrix made in 1969 (ChatGPT & Midjourney)

I decided to ask ChatGPT who it would cast in a hypothetical version of the Matrix made in 1969, and then asked Midjourney to create images based on those choices! https://youtu.be/E0JttGNji3U ChatGPT casting choices for the Matrix made in 1969 Certainly, creating a hypothetical cast for a 1969 version of The Matrix is an exciting…

Visualizing ESKOM Loadshedding Data

In this post I’ll share some visualizations of ESKOM Loadshedding data created in Looker Studio (Google Data Studio). Load shedding in South Africa is a method used by the country’s primary power utility, Eskom, to prevent the national electric grid from total collapse. This becomes necessary when the demand for electricity exceeds available supply. The…

Visualizing GA4 Geographic Data with Python

In this post I just wanted to show a couple of basic examples of how you can display Google Analytics 4 data using Python. I used a very basic data set of countries and views (pageviews) from my website in Looker Studio. Above: a Choropleth Map made with Python Above: a Bubble Map made with…

YouTube Analytics Looker Studio Dashboard Template

I’ve made a YouTube Analytics template for Looker Studio that you can download from the ByMarketers website. I used YouTube Analytics data from my own small channel where I’ve messing around with AI generated images. Here is the link to view the YouTube Analytics template. Screenshots from the YouTube Analytics Report Template Looker Studio Template…

1960s Dune movie (ChatGPT & Midjourney)

So I decided to see which actors ChatGPT would cast in a hypothetical Dune movie made in 1969! I then used Midjourney to depict the actors as the various characters in the movie made in the 1960s. You can watch a video of the images or scroll down and view them below. Enjoy! I asked…

Awesome Aliens (Midjourney)

Experimented with various Midjourney prompts to generate some images of aliens. Using Midjourney Version 5.1 the images are the best yet, and very bright, colourful and detailed. I hope you enjoy them! https://youtu.be/iLkQjZuxMdk My Other Blog Posts

Futuristic Faces from Midjourney

I’ve been using Midjourney V5.1 recently. The results seem a significant improvement from previous versions, and a huge leap from less than a year ago. This post features a collection of futuristic faces. Enjoy! https://youtu.be/RoSROLQkTLw My Other Blog Posts If you liked this post about futuristic faces, you might enjoy my other blog posts!

Midjourney Science Fiction Concept Art

In this post I wanted to share some cool images Midjourney created recently that I’m grouping under “Science Fiction Concept Art”. If you’d like me to create some images for you feel free to email me at michaelhoweely [at] gmail.com. Here’s a video of the images along with some AI-generated music made using AIVA. https://youtu.be/x7qqZbGuSYA…

Midjourney Concept Video – Brutalist Dystopia

I experimented with creating a Midjourney Concept Video based on images based around the idea of a “Brutalist Dystopia”. That is, a dystopia with lots of Brutalist architecture. Below is the video! https://youtu.be/AxyCnkvRRNg Summary from ChatGPT-4 on Brutalist Architecture Brutalist architecture is a style that emerged in the mid-20th century, primarily between the 1950s and…

Midjourney Concept Art – Guarding the Gateway

I was experimenting with the chaos function in Midjourney, and kept repeating the prompt “a sinister being guarding a gateway to another dimension. Cinematic. HD. HR giger. –ar 16:9 –v 5 –c 50” again and again. It created so many interesting and unique images I wanted to share them all in a video below. https://youtu.be/RmERPlfqGgc…

Using Midjourney for Photography

Recently a few people have reached out to me about creating some images using Midjourney for them. I figured I’d share some examples of potential uses of Midjourney for creating photographic images. I’ve shared examples of how you can use an AI image tool like Midjourney to create images that mimic the following types of…

ChatGPT-4 made this game!

I asked ChatGPT-4 to make a game similar to the famous “Dinosaur Game” that you can play in Google Chrome. Below is the game! Use the W key to make the square jump over the rapidly approaching green blocks! How GPT-4 made the game I what quite a lengthy and involved process to create the…

Midjourney Realism: August 2022 vs March 2023

Midjourney V5 was recently released, and I wanted to compare Version 3 images from August 2022 with images created using the same prompts in March 2023 and see how they compared in terms of realism. For all the images below the first image was created in August 2022 using Midjourney Version 3 and the second…

Looker Studio dashboards designed by AI

Lately I’ve been posting several blog posts featuring AI images, so thought I’d do a crossover and post about Looker Studio dashboard designed by AI. In this case I’m using Midjourney, which as improved greatly in the past year. Would you like some human-designed Looker Studio dashboards? If you’d like to take a look at…

Midjourney V5 at the Movies

I wanted to see how Midjourney V5 would handle simple prompts asking it to recreate some popular movies. The results were pretty good and interesting. I’ve shared the four panel image, and one of the Midjourney Version 5 images I’ve upscaled. For all the images I also included the following as part of the prompt….

Midjourney V5: Photos of Cape Town

Midjourney V5 (Version 5) was recently released and I wanted to test it out. I decided to see how well it could do creating photographs of Cape Town. Midjourney has come a long way since I first used it and the results are becoming more and more impressive. I’ve included photographs of people as well…

GPT-4 story and Midjourney images: Humans vs Robots

I was playing around making 1970s science fiction illustrations in Midjourney using around the theme of “human workers rising up against their cruel robot masters in the far future. 1970s science fiction illustration”. I also thought it would be interesting to compare how ChatGPT 3’s ability to create a plot synopsis compared with the newly…

Using ChatGPT and Midjourney to create an Anime movie set in Cape Town

I decided to see how much I could use simply ChatGPT and Midjourney to create a movie with minimal input from me. For those unfamiliar with them, ChatGPT allows you to create AI-generated text and Midjourney allows you to create AI-generated images. I used the prompt “provide a synopsis for a cyberpunk anime science fiction…

Creating movie concept art using ChatGPT and Midjourney

I wanted to experiment with how ChatGPT and Midjourney could be combined to flesh out movie plots and concept art. For those unfamiliar, ChatGPT is a tool that allows you to write a prompt and generate text based on what you requested. It describes itself as “an AI language model developed by OpenAI that is…

Midjourney Concept Art: A 1980s Dystopia

I’ve enjoyed using Midjourney, a new online AI image generator, for creating images. I enjoy creating images within a particular theme. Last time I created many images within the theme of “Retro Space Travel Photos”. This time the theme is “a 1980s Dystopia”. I started creating images using the following variations of the following prompt:…

DALL-E 2 vs Midjourney

I wanted to compare DALL-E 2 vs Midjourney, as Midjourney has recently enabled users to use –test and –testp to upgrade their images and make them much more realistic. Using –test and –testp (test being a more creative improvement and testp leaning towards more photorealistic improvement) and comparing to current DALL-E 2 outputs. So I…

Retro Space Travel Photos from Midjourney

I tried creating some new Midjourney images using their recently released Test options and loved this retro space travel aesthetic that I found. To create them I simply used the prompt “a 1970s spaceship, film grain, 1970s, retro futurism, cinematic, science fiction”. Adding in additional bits of information such as “crew”, “robot”, “cockpit” and more…

Realistic Midjourney Images

On 28 August 2022 Midjourney released some new options for improving image quality that allow you to create much more realistic images. Two new modes were released A general purpose artistic mode you can use by typing –test A photo-realism mode you can use by typing –testp I wanted to share some of them, and…

More Midjourney Images

More images I created using Midjourney. For these images I added –ar 16:9 to to the end of each prompt so that the images would be generated in a 16:9 aspect ratio, the standard ratio for widescreen televisions and most films and TV shows. For some images I also used many different descriptive words. For…

Making Midjourney Monsters

Since I was a teenager I’ve been fascinated by the artwork of H.R. Giger, the Swiss artist who, among many other works, designed the creature (later dubbed “xenomorph”) in the 1979 film Alien. Giger’s unique style featured biomechanical creatures in nightmarish environments. I recently tried out Midjourney, a new tool for creating beautiful (and as…

Testing out Midjourney

I recently started creating images with Midjourney, a new online tool that allows you to create images created by Artificial Intelligence. According to their website, Midjourney “is an independent research lab exploring new mediums of thought and expanding the imaginative powers of the human species. We are a small self-funded team focused on design, human…

Comparing Craiyon, DALL-E 2, and Midjourney

I thought I’d add photos from three AI image generators; Craiyon, DALL-E 2 and Midjourney. How they describe themselves; “Craiyon, formerly DALL·E mini, is an AI model that can draw images from any text prompt!” “DALL·E 2 is a new AI system that can create realistic images and art from a description in natural language….

Multiple DALL-E 2 images created from the same prompt

For those that haven’t tried out DALL-E 2, it’s a new Artificial Intelligence (AI) system that can create realistic images and art from a description in natural language. You can take a look at some previous posts on the topic Testing out DALL-E 2 More Examples of AI-Generated DALL-E 2 Images Comparing different photo styles…

Comparing different photo styles in DALL-E 2

Wanted to show how DALL-E 2 will create different images based on the same subject matter, depending on what style you add to the prompt. To recap, DALL-E 2 is a new online tool that allows users to generate images from text prompts in a few seconds. They can generate images of the same subject…

Testing out DALL-E 2

I was recently granted access to DALL-E 2, the impressive new AI system that can generate images from text prompts. I don’t have anything technical to say about it, I just wanted to share some of the incredible images it has produced. If you’d like to know more about it here are some links; Open…

How to combine string fields in Google Data Studio

Have you ever needed to combine string fields in Google Data Studio? I tried to do it the other day and it was more difficult than expected. In this post I’ll show a method that solves how to combine different string fields into one field. This method is from Harry Bryars whom you can follow…

Comparing Cape Town and Toronto

In this post I’ll compare and contrast some things comparing Cape Town, South Africa with Toronto, Canada! 🇿🇦 🇨🇦 Size According to Google Toronto is 630.2 km² while Cape Town is 2,445 km². In terms of population the City of Cape Town has 3.74 million people living in it while Toronto has 2.73 million people living in it….

How to combine data from two BigQuery public datasets using SQL

So in this blog post I’ll show how you can combine data from two BigQuery public datasets using SQL and to visualize the data in Data Studio. So let’s say we want to combine data from two different public datasets available in Google BiqQuery; the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Indicators and the World Bank’s…

Use Parameters to change Column Dimensions in Google Data Studio

In this post I’ll show a method for using Parameters to change Column Dimensions in Data Studio. Before we begin… Before I begin I need to say that if you are interested in learning more about Parameters in Google Data Studio you read this article: Google Data Studio secondary dimension like inside Google Analytics by Mehdi Oudjida as it…

How to use Reference Lines in Google Data Studio

Reference Lines in Google Data Studio are a new feature that lets you plot averages, targets and other values against your data in certain charts. I’ll show you a few examples in this blog post. Live Examples of Reference Lines in Google Data Studio So I’ll show you a Google Data Studio report with some…

Random, Arty Google Data Studio Templates

So occasionally I’ll mess around and create random Google Data Studio Templates while drinking. I’ve never known what to do with them but decided I will stick them here. So without further ado… As Above, So Below, Super Mario So further context will be provided. Red Minimalist No further context or explanation will be provided….

Visualizing Data showing Police Brutality by Country

So in the past week Police Brutality has been a major issue in Canada, South Africa and the United States. I thought that some might find it useful to see a data visualization showing Police Brutality by Country. Police Brutality by Country The Data Studio visualization below shows three measures; PopulationPeople Killed by Security ForcesRate…

How to use Google Maps in Google Data Studio

Yesterday Google Data Studio launched a cool new feature – Google Maps as a chart type! This is major game changer for Data Studio and opens up a lot of possibilities. There are a lot of BigQuery public datasets featuring geographic data that it was simply not possibly to display on the existing geo maps….

COVID-19 cases by Region of the World

I wanted to build another Coronavirus dashboard in Google Data Studio, this time looking at the number of COVID-19 cases by region of the world. COVID-19 Cases by Region of the World dashboard in Google Data Studio Below is the dashboard showing the number of Coronavirus cases by geographic region. Using the Johns Hopkins University…

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I’m Michael


I’m a South African digital analyst living in Toronto, Canada. I blog about digital marketing, web analytics and data visualization.

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