About
The Visual Layer is an editorial publication that explains complex systems with a single image you can read slowly.
What we publish
Each piece is a long-read infographic about technology, data and the systems that hold them up. The image does not accompany the text: the image is the article, and everything around it exists to place it, summarise it and say where it comes from.
How we work
Every infographic is published with its editorial context and the key takeaways it rests on, so you can tell what you are about to find before you settle in to read it.
When a piece draws on outside material, the sources are listed at the end with a direct link, so you can check them yourself.
The archive is published in Spanish and in English. Each language is a complete edition, not a browser translation of the other.
How to read the infographics
They are meant to be read in parts. Open one and zoom into whichever section interests you; the small detail is there on purpose.
In the viewer you can zoom, move the image, fit it back to the screen or see it at actual size. From the keyboard, the arrows move between infographics while the image is fitted and move the image once it is zoomed; plus and minus zoom, and zero fits it again.
To find something specific, the archive filters by category, by tag or by search, and what you filter stays in the address, so you can share exactly what you are looking at.