BESHStatNG v0.4.0: Publication-ready Chart Export + Animated 3D XYZ Scatterplot GIFs

The latest BESHStatNG release (v0.4.0) adds two highly requested features:
(1) a dedicated Chart Export dialog for publication-quality figures, and
(2) an Animated GIF workflow for the 3D XYZ scatterplot.
Both features work directly inside Excel and do not require installing external tools or scripting environments.

1) New: Export Chart dialog (publication-ready quality)

Exporting figures for manuscripts and reports is often painful: charts look fine on screen but become blurry or unreadable when copied into documents.
The new Export Chart dialog solves this by letting you choose the final pixel size and (where applicable) the intended DPI—so your exported figures stay crisp.

BESHStatNG Export Chart dialog — *Export Chart dialog (BESHStatNG v0.4.0)*

How it works (in practice)

Select (or create) the chart you want to export.
Open BESH Stat NG → Export chart.
Choose:
- Export format (see below)
- DPI (if applicable)
- Width/Height in pixels (your actual output resolution)
- Preserve aspect ratio if you want to keep proportions automatically
- JPG quality if exporting as JPG
Click Export and choose a file name and location.

Export formats: which one should you pick?

PNG – best default for charts (lossless; crisp text and lines)
TIFF – useful for print workflows / journal submissions
JPG – smaller files, but lossy (may blur text and thin lines)
GIF – palette-based (8-bit); mainly for legacy/web usage
EMF – a true vector format (where available), great for scaling and editing

DPI vs pixels (quick rule of thumb)

DPI controls the intended print density, while pixel size controls the actual rendered resolution.
A useful relationship:

Physical width (inches) ≈ pixels / DPI
Example: 3000 px at 300 DPI ≈ 10 inches wide

Large figures and reliability

Very large exports can stress memory even if the final file (especially PNG) ends up small. BESHStatNG includes internal safeguards to reduce out-of-memory failures, and supports special handling for large BMP exports (tiling/streaming) to improve reliability.

👉 Full guide: Chart Export help page

2) New: Animated GIF workflow for 3D XYZ scatterplot

The XYZ 3D Scatterplot tool creates a 3D-looking plot by projecting 3D points (x, y, z) onto a 2D chart canvas, and drawing the “cage”, tick marks, and optional visual aids (plane projections, gridlines, and Z-drop lines).
In v0.4.0, it also supports an Animated GIF workflow to create smooth rotations and camera movements over time.

Animated GIF workflow (what it produces)

The current workflow generates a sequence of frame GIFs (0.gif, 1.gif, 2.gif, …) by re-drawing the plot with a table of view parameters (rotation, zoom, pan, delay). These frames can then be combined into a single animated GIF.

XYZ 3D scatterplot dialog showing Animated GIF input range — *Animated GIF inputs live in the same XYZ 3D Scatterplot dialog*

Example: animated result

Animated XYZ 3D scatterplot (example) — *Example: frame-based animation after frames are combined*

Why this is useful

Show clusters/separation more clearly by rotating the view.
Create lightweight visuals for presentations, teaching, and web sharing.
Everything happens in Excel—no external plotting engines required.

👉 Full guide: XYZ 3D Scatterplot help page (including Animated GIF workflow)

Help updated

The documentation has been expanded to cover the new Export Chart dialog, recommended settings, and troubleshooting, as well as the animated GIF workflow for the XYZ 3D Scatterplot.

Try it in v0.4.0

If you already use BESHStatNG, update to v0.4.0 and give these features a try:
export your next figure at a controlled pixel size/DPI, and spin your 3D scatterplot into an animation for presentations.

Feedback and bug reports are welcome—especially if you hit edge cases with very large exports.