Understanding 3D Graph

A 3D graph can look confusing to start with, but it is really just a set of 2D graphs lined up against one another. The example shown below is really just how many products were sold during a year in 2 dimensions, with the 3rd dimension being for each year. The advantage of the 3D graph is that you can look at all the graphs at once and directly compare them.

The best way to present the graph is to slowly introduce each row of data by using the keyboard numbers 0 to 9 or clicking on the row/column title switches. Starting the graph displays all rows so it gives immediate impact to your audience. If you have 4 rows of data (like in the sample data: 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003), press 1, 2 and 3 on the keyboard to leave just the first row of data visible. It is then easy to explain because it is essentially just a 2D graph. Then press 1 on the keyboard to show exactly the same data but for the next year of 2001. Continue until all rows are displayed so your audience can now easily understand the 3rd dimension (year) and also realise how useful it is to compare everything at once without being confused. You can also display just the first (2000) and last row (2003) to show the position of the company when it first started and what it is now.

Scenario:
If Swan Studios was told to cancel developing one type of product to focus more on the successful products, which one would it be? If you looked at the 2D graph for 2003, the simple answer would be Security because it has the lowest value in 2003. However, placing the yearly graphs side-by-side we can see that Security sales are actually increasing, while Database sales are decreasing. By finding this trend, we would be more likely to choose Database products as the best choice to cancel development. Extending this idea further and looking at the other products, we can see that Graphics and Games products have consistently increased in large steps, but Database products have decreased at about the same rate. The 3D graph shows us that the Database products were the biggest seller in 2000, so we may need to investigate why this was the case as further justification to cancel it's production.