Challenge: How can you take a hard-to-explain process, and express it so someone can get a general understanding in 2 minutes?

The answer: animation.

Made with After Effects and Illustrator

The Regulatory team at Pace Analytical needed help to explain one of their services. At its most basic level, the service involves helping companies collect, validate and store raw data.

And the team wanted not only to educate clients, but entertain them too (sweetening them up for the sell).

The process

Putting pen to paper, I started with sketches based on the script I received. The Regulatory team didn’t really have much creative input at this stage, so I came up with a stroyboard that they initially approved. This helped me plan out how many scenes and objects I needed to design and animate.

I also did research into different styles, created a moodboard, and developed character designs.

Then I used those designs and made a few polished renders of the storyboard. It was crucial to show the Regulatory team a feel for what the final product would look like.

After seeing the first round of designs, the Regulatory team decided to make some changes to the storyboard. I was glad to adjust my designs at this early stage, before too much work went into a direction they were not happy with.

An abandoned still from my first storyboard.

For this project I had to learn how to do character animation. So I found a great plugin for rigging characters called Duik Bassel. While I’m always learning new tools and better ways to design, rigging needed a lot of trial and error.

While animating the characters, I actually re-designed the base layers in Illustrator so I could use a single template for their rigs in After Effects. This saved me time in the long-run, and would benefit future animations.

After I had a rough version of the animations completed, I read the script to get a general feel for the timing of the movements. In doing so, I discovered some better edits to the script for a better flow. Then I was ready to hire a professional voiceover artist through an online service.

Once all the assets were in After Effects, I fine-tuned the timing of the movements to the voiceover and background music. I also added in some sound effects to enhance the experience.

I finally had a great memorable solution for the Regulatory team that quickly demonstrated their service and was able to delight customers.

Hopefully you enjoyed reading about my design process! If your interested in working with an animator, please contact me.