Customizing Waterfall Plots

The Origin Waterfall graph plots one or more Y columns, or a range from one or more Y columns, as a series of line plots that "recede" into the page. Such graphs are effective for comparing datasets collected under conditions where some parameter is varied incrementally.

Once you have created the waterfall plot, you can change the viewing angle or label the individual line plots. For the waterfall graph with Y or Z color mapping, you can also apply the color mapping to the lines in Y or Z direction. Other customizations (line color, axis color, font size, etc.) are applied in the same way that they are for other 2D plot types.

Resizing the plot and changing the plot viewing angle

There are two modes for graphical manipulation of waterfall plots:

• Click once on the graph and square handles appear at the layer corners.
• Click a second time on the graph and triangular handles appear at the layer corners.

The first click edit mode (square handles) allows you to move the layer's position on the page, to resize the layer and to change the viewing angle. When the cursor is a double-headed arrow, the graph's origin is fixed but you can change the layer dimensions and internal angles that define the edit box surrounding the waterfall plot. When the cursor is a four-headed arrow, you can move the layer on the page.

The second click edit mode (triangular handles) allows you to drag one of the triangular handles to skew the viewing angle without altering the length or position of the X axis (note that if you fail to place the cursor on a handle, then drag with your mouse, you will move the layer). Skewing of the plot can also be accomplished by editing the X Offset and Y Offset boxes on the Waterfall tab of the Plot Details dialog box (Format: Layer).

Labelling the individual line plots

It is possible to label the individual line plots in the waterfall graph using information in a Parameters row of the worksheet. If you are importing source data into the worksheet, note that you can use the Import Wizard to designate a row of header information in that data file as your Parameters row. The Parameters row might, for instance, contain the wavelength at which the dataset was collected, in which case, you could use each dataset's wavelength to label the series of line plots.

To label the individual line plots using the information stored in a Parameters row:

1. Create your waterfall graph.
2. Select Format: Layer from the main menu to open the Plot Details dialog.
3. Go to the Waterfall tab.
4. Select the parameter row with the Z Value Source drop-down list, here can be a numeric row or text row.
5. Click OK to close Plot Details.
6. Delete the Z axis title and labels from the waterfall graph.
7. Open the Command Window (Window: Command Window) and at the command line, type:

   legend -p

Note that if no Parameter information exists, the legend -p command switch does nothing.

Color mapping the lines

The lines in waterfall graph can be color mapped along two directions, Y direction and Z direction. To create these color mapping waterfall graph, please refer to 2D Waterfall Y Color Mapping and 2D Waterfall Z Color Mapping.

Once the color mapping waterfall graph is created, the mapping levels and colors can be customized by yourself. You can set the number of levels, color of each level, theme of the color map, etc. Though the color mapping settings are the same, Y color mapping is for Y values and Z color mapping is for Z values, the former can make the color different for different Y values and the latter can make the color different for different Z values.

2D Waterfall Y Color Mapping	2D Waterfall Z Color Mapping

For more details about how to set the color mapping of waterfall graph, please refer to this page.

Plot drawing order and hiding/showing hidden lines

You can reverse the plotting order so the waterfall graph is drawn back to front:

1. From the menu, choose Format: Axes: Z-axis.
2. Reverse the Scale tab From and To settings.

To hide or show hidden lines:

1. From the menu, choose Format: Layer.
2. Click the Waterfall tab.
3. Enable or disable Show Hidden Lines.