Web Synchronize Information Flash Animation

Project Type: Motion Graphics, Marketing, Animation
Client: Frozen Mountain Software - [website]
Duration: 1.5 months
Role: Animator, consultant, storyboarder

Results

Context

The founders of the start up company Frozen Mountain Software needed help in marketing their product "Web Synchronize". The problem was that the product was very technical and they felt that potential customers who would be buying their product would be CEOs or managers that may not quite understand what their innovative product could do for them. I was asked to help them create materials that would more visually demonstrate the products capability.

Process

I began with meeting the client for two things. First was to gain an understanding of the product that I would be helping them market. The second was to brainstorm a few ideas of what sort of deliverables they were interested in. I showed them some examples of information models I had created as well as the "Crisis of Credit" (http://vimeo.com/3261363) animation to show them some possibilities of where this could go. I also created a simple animation of a few second to give them an idea of what could be done.

As we felt that motion would be the best way to gain an understanding of the product and also satisfied with the sample, the decision was that we would create an animation. The client came up with a simple script and scenario that compared a website with and without the capabilities of web synchronize. This was followed by a graphical explanation of what was happening on the back end. I created story boards to illustrate the scenes to ensure that I was communicating what was necessary.

With my guidance, the client recorded the narration which I took and began animating with. I insisted on having the recordings first before beginning to animate as it helped to make the speech more natural. If the animation was done first, often the narration is rushed, stretched out or has gaps of silence in hopes to catch up or wait for the animation.

The first scene took the longest and was revised the most as I used to to figure out the best way to utilize Flash 8 as well as to create icons and symbols to be used in the rest of the scene. Also, almost all the sound recordings required to be cut a bit in some way or another. Once all the scenes were animated, we went through various revision ironing out all the details from animation jitters to slightly off synch sub-titles.

When it came to rendering the video, the render from Flash 8 did not play properly when uploaded on YouTube or Vimeo. As a result, I had to render a raw animation, then encode it using Final Cut Pro

In the final package I delivered to the client, I included detailed instruction on how they could re-render the animation if they needed to add or change anything. I also created a handout upon their request that they could give out during trade shows and conferences