3D Pie Chart

[Chris Cole]

Hello guys. Is there a way, any way to create a 3d Pie Chart that can be rotated?

I've been trying to accomplish this in many ways but I really can't wrap my head around it....

[Curran]

Hi Chris,

Rotating a pie chart makes the data less readable. Adding rotation distorts the pie slices, so some slices get bigger or smaller. Even if you use an orthographic projection (as opposed to a perspective projection), the protruding edges coming out of the slices cause some slices to take up more pixels than others in a way that is not based on the data.

As I understand it, the only reason to rotate a pie chart is to intentionally mislead your viewers, like this famous example by Steve Jobs.

See how the 19.5% slice is bigger than it should be? It is tempting to want 3D pie charts because they look fancy. I think lots of folks use 3D pie charts for this reason without realizing that it ruins the effectiveness of the visualization. If your goal is to present the data clearly, perhaps it would be better to use a bar chart.

Here are a few articles that deal with this topic in more detail:

• 2D’s Company, 3D’s a Crowd
  
• Death to Pie Charts
• Pie charts and other circular visualizations
  
• The Worst Chart In The World

If you really want a 3D pie chart with D3, here's an example that shows one way it can be done: 3D Donut by NPashaP.

Best regards,

Curran

On Sunday, February 7, 2016 at 12:09:37 PM UTC-8, Chris Cole wrote:

Hello guys. Is there a way, any way to create a 3d Pie Chart that can be rotated?

I've been trying to accomplish this in many ways but I really can't wrap my head around it....

[Suren]

Hi Chris/Curran,

Here's another article on pie charts written by a colleague.

Thanks,

Surendran

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