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While exploring the worldwide GDP results, I happened to come across a graph from The Economist.
I was fascinated, rather intrigued too see how MS-Excel could be used to convert the big boring data into a spectacular presentable form. And now, I present a small tutorial on how you can make these kinds of graphs for the data you have.
NOTE: *All the data used below is purely hypothetical.*
Make the spreadsheet of the data that you are holding.
Select the range of data that you want in the column graph. Go to Insert Column 2-D column stacked column
The result will be obtained as above.
Now you may wish to add any data to the chart, let us assume the data under TOTAL was not entered.
Then, right click anywhere on the obtained chart and go to SELECT DATA. A dialogue box, as shown below, will appear.
Under the legend entries, click on ADD tab. A new dialogue box will appear. Under the series name, write total. And for the series value, select the ‘TOTAL’ row from the spreadsheet.
Save the changes. The new graph will look like the image below.
Now to obtain the line graph for ‘Total’, select ‘total’ on graph. Right click on the ‘total’. Follow Change series chart type X Y scatter scatter with smooth lines.
The new graph obtained will look like the image below.
Now to reach our final graph, only thing that’s left to be done is the formatting part.
STEP 1 : To remove the grid lines, select the grid lines and press DELETE.
STEP 2 : To shift the legend downwards, right click on the legend format legend choose the bottom option in legend options.
STEP 3 : To change color of columns of each country, select the individual country, right click Format legend entry Fill select the color.
STEP 4 : To change background for the chart, right click on any vacant space in the chart Format chart area fill solid fill choose the color.
STEP 5 : To change background for the plot are, right click on any vacant space in the plot Format plot area fill solid fill choose the color.
The final graph would appear like the image below.
Thus, an attempt has been made to present to you, a method for plotting graph that would make your data look more presentable.
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