Just for fun, we wanted to show you a cool new thing we saw at the Rootstech genealogy conference. Puzilla is a free tool that automagically builds a lovely ancestry or descendancy chart from your Family Tree information. (You must have a Family Search account to use this, which you can sign up for here - free!)
Just watching Puzilla work is mesmerizing. You enter the Family Tree ID of the starting person (it defaults to you, but you can enter any other person on your family tree), indicate whether you want a descendancy or ancestry chart, and type in the number of generations to display. Then it does its hypnotic, beautiful dance as it builds your wheel on screen right before your very eyes.
Each dot represents a person (blue for male, pink for female--clever! ;-) and as you hover over the dot, the person's vital information will appear in a box on screen. (As far as I understand it, the only information you can view on living people are those in your own family tree.)
I haven't yet grasped the genealogical implications of its usefulness as a research tool (except that it did help me discover a duplication in my family tree which I've since corrected.) But as a book designer, I can say that this would make a beautiful addition to a family or personal history book, especially to point out specific relationships on a larger scale as I've done above.
createfan.com 9-generation chart
At this writing, Puzilla does not offer a way to print the chart or save as a PDF. (I had to do a screen print to capture the top image, which would not offer me enough resolution for a sharp reproduction in a book.) But according to their website, they will be offering this feature soon.
familysearch.org 7-generation chart
In the meantime, don't forget about free pedigree fan charts you can get from Family Search or createfan.com. These also make lovely additions to a family history book. Another software I like is Charting Companion, which gives you a number of options and templates for creating genealogy charts.
