Category: 3D Animation

New corporate logo converted to 3D animation to brand company’s future videos

February 14, 2016 Aaron Belchamber Leave a comment

The marketing department was looking for a “metallic and industrial style” to their three-letter logo.  Once we received the logo in vector format as an Adobe Illustrator (.ai) file, we put together a concept based on this client’s input.  “Make it look metallic, make it do something to come into the scene, then have it come to rest.  We plan on using it to consistently brand videos pertaining to our corporate logo.”

Well, not much to go by.  Conceiving a new logo and corporate identity package is challenging enough, but for video producers and animators, it’s very challenging to glean the visual tastes and expectations from a client.  Videos and animations d0n’t exist in just two dimensions like flat print logos, they don’t even exist in  just three dimensions, like a static 3D model, but we’re dealing with four dimensions — the extra dimension of time!

I’ve had hundreds of clients I’ve produced 3D animations for, including here in Northeast Florida from Saint Augustine, through Jacksonville, FL up to Fernandina Beach, and in my 14 years doing 3D animation, not one refused to pay or complained they didn’t get what they asked for.  The funny thing is, most people who want a 3D animation, especially a logo animation, didn’t provide much guidance or details about what they wanted in the first place — in fairness, they couldn’t really, because it didn’t exist before!

There’s a reason for that — video is much more complex than flat, two-dimensional images that don’t ever need to move, change, or transition into another scene.  In this creative business, you have to be able to manage expectations and have a high level of uncertainty, especially when dealing with new people you don’t have a history producing anything creative with.

Four dimensions instead of two?

When working with organizations on videos, there’s a lot more preparation and details to consider than designing a print ad, or coming up with an ad campaign concept.  That’s okay, video production experts not only need to be professionals at their craft, they need to help business owners and organization leaders without much video or multimedia experience turn their concepts and visions into tangible results they’ll be happy to use as intended.  Feedback and details about how they want a video to look and those intangibles they want the video to convey — tone, mood, etc, can often lead to much higher production quality results, but some companies know they need something and don’t know where to begin.  I’ve encountered dealing with people from both extremes and each has their challenges and strengths.

The marketing professionals who may not have a clear vision of the details are usually more willing to be open to suggestions, leading to more possibilities to be more creative.  They know they need something clean and professional to help brand their company and they’re willing to leave the rest up to an expert in the production of visual media.

We try to observe the culture and understand the nature of the message the video will need to convey, we look through their identity and other marketing materials to capture the essence.  I know, sounds deep, sounds like a lot of fluff, but capturing the spirit of an organization in 30 seconds or even short if it’s not a TV commercial, is a complex concept.

On the other hand, working with people experienced in working with multimedia who provide clear details about what they are looking for have done their homework and so there’s less resistance because they’ve cleared the path of expectations throughout the organization already.  This leads to faster production and turnaround and, admittedly, these type of 3D animation projects could bring down production time so much this upfront preparation and extra directorial creative guidance is worth considering providing 3D animation services at a discount.

Getting a 3D logo animation for a  company is a process

Short logo animations like the 3D logo animation above can’t be expressed in a simple timeline script.  Providing 3D animation services for over 14 years nationally and throughout Florida, I’m happy to say the demand is growing.  As many marketing arms of all types of businesses realize creating visuals for things in 3D is attainable.  Imagine a new home construction builder who has some great plans but no models yet, or they sold their model home to a resident who wouldn’t take too kindly having a video production crew taking videos of their homes.  A 3D model can always be reused, a new color put on the walls, walls removed, pools in the backyard added, all without actually building anything physically.

The sky isn’t even the limit for 3D!

There are no limits to 3D, for business, creatives, or just hobbyists.  What about an inventor of a new product that’s waiting to be manufactured?  An ad agency that wants to show a “proof of concept” through 3D pre-viz (pre-visualization)?  A company who wants to break out into some immersive VR (Virtual Reality) presentations at an upcoming trade show?  A new medical procedure that a company like Arthrex wants to sell the proper devices and equipment to doctors to help save patients’ lives?

Storyboards, rough sketches of main motion, events and transitions in a video are helpful, along with looking at some samples together that are similar to the consensus what an organization is looking for, but 3D modelling and animations for business is exploding as more realize the age of Star Trek is already here!

 


ring in the rain thumbnail

3D jewelry animations an affordable way to show off jewelry products on-air and online

August 17, 2015 Aaron Belchamber Leave a comment

Here is a small sample of some 3D jewelry animation scenes of some jewelry designed by a 16-store retail jewelry chain along the east coast.  They simply supplied the 3D models from their jewelry design department in Rhino 3D and Autodesk Maya.  I then had to speak with their marketing department about the use and context of the jewelry — something dramatized and unique for their jewelry TV commercials.  Using Autodesk 3D Studio Max, I convert the files from these substandard 3D programs so I can put them in scenes, create lights and wrap them with materials that will help make the scene pop in 3D and smaller sizes for the web.

Multi-use 3D models save time in photography and video production fees

Some jewelers have a full-time photographer or two on staff who can spend a full day shooting just a few pieces of jewelry.  Then they would pay extra for a video production company to shoot the video on a turn table.  Oh yes, the ever exciting and always predictable shot of jewelry pieces spinning on a turntable in one direction or another.  Ho-hum.

Since 2010, I’ve helped jewelry companies like Riddle’s Jewelry and smaller stores similar to Jacksonville’s Underwood’s Jewelry to showcase their jewelry in unique ways.  Yes, the turntable shots are useful for people to get a feel for the look and dimensions of the jewelry piece from every straight-on angle, but in 3D we can make the camera fly over, through and around it.

There are more exciting options and ways to make a splash and to show off your jewelry lines in more unique, eye-catching ways.  In less than a day, they got samples of these scenes – they wanted the camera to show off the jewelry in unique angles so I put the ring on a watery surface and made it rain around it, giving it a sexy style that went with their “walking in the rain” advertising campaign.

I can’t show you the final results due to contract restrictions, but you get the gist.

Show off the products on air and online and boost your jewelry sales with 3D animation

Selling jewelry is an act of visual stimulation.  The better you show your jewelry, the more sales you will make online AND in-store.  The two aren’t exclusive.  If you get more traffic to your site showing interest in one jewelry piece but sales lag online for that piece, that does not mean your website is failing, especially if the cost of the jewelry is over $300.

The higher the jewelry’s price, the higher the chance a buyer will pre-shop and find out details about your product online but still want to go into a store and see, touch, hold, wear and compare.

Jewelry stores, websites, and product visuals are all necessary and symbiotic

Your bring and mortar jewelry stores will not survive without a mobile-friendly, fast, and the largest selection of all of your jewelry products.  You will sell more products if you showcase your jewelry in interesting ways and informative angles.  They all depend on each other and help each other getting traffic to your website and to your retail stores.  It sounds so logical, yet so many jewelry marketers stumble and live in a pre-internet world, they take maybe two flat photos of their products and perhaps the jewelry piece goes on their website but it’s not a priority.  This is pure plain idiocy.

If someone goes on your jewelry e-commerce site and doesn’t find what they are looking for, do you think they’re still going to waste their time driving to your store?  You just lost them to a competitor who had what they are looking for, it’s that simple… and obvious.

This is where your website helps your retail store more than any other form of advertising — think about it, a radio or TV commercial is one direction, the web is interactive so people can explore, spend more time learning and looking about your products and services.

Of the jewelry stores we made their sites mobile-friendly and increased the quality of their product offerings while improving their site performance and SEO, we saw a dramatic spike in sales in jewelry stores online and in their stores within months.

I know, there are jewelers out their not interested in making money, they’re happy operating in the 20th century and ignore the internet and the mobile device revolution.  They ignore the fact 3D animations of their existing jewelry designs could highlight and showcase their products and boost sales while cutting costs in photographing and video production.  They’re happy being the status quo and they’re ignoring the fact their competitors are increasing their sales, standing out from them online while simultaneously decreasing their expenses.  Eventually, their complacency towards the web and media production regarding their products, their insistence that they don’t need to put all their offerings online which hampers their in-store traffic substantially, will reflect in lower web retail sales, a decrease in mall traffic which will force them to eventually contract because they refuse to modernize and compete.  Denial and big know-it-all egos can destroy a company, can’t say they weren’t warned.