Motion Chart Over a Map Background

[GuyE]

I found that showing motion chart to possible users is quite hard.
They look at the chart and are very excited about how good it looks,
but they find it difficult to find useful implementations for it.

One of the ideas that I got was to use longitude and altitude as the X
and Y axis (which prevents the motion), and use the color and size of
the data points as the changing values. Indeed these visualization
were easier to understand by the users, but the missing background of
the map outline made it harder to use it.

If I could change the background of the motion chart to include an
image or batter yet one of the image maps of Google visualization (for
example Geomaps :http://code.google.com/apis/visualization/
documentation/gallery/geomap.html), it can made motion chart much more
useful for my team.

[VizGuy]

We are aware of the on trivial use of this chart.
In a way - there is no direct answer for this. It is a strong tool, to tell complicated stories.

Yet - the concept of using geographic map as the base for this chart was raised before. We have it in our feature requests list.

Regards,
VizGuy

[Sasidhar Akkiraju]

Hi Viz Guy, 

It this possible now? I don't see any info on the developer guides on how this can be achieved. 

Thanks,

Sasidhar.

[Coppedge]

Is it possible to overlay a motion chart on a gvisMap? Perhaps using gvisMerge? The only gvisMerge example I see puts object next to each other, not overlaid.

I've been able to have the motion chart draw its own US state map crudely, by including simplified lat long coordinates in the dataframe and selecting states so that their trails make borders. But then the motion chart for other points moves jerkily, displaying only every 4-10 years instead of a smoother interpolation. That's why an overlay seems to be a better option.