A Little Taste Of My 3D Animation Skills

At January 7, 2012
By John McDuffie
In 3D Animation / 3D Design / Video Editing

I wanted to take a minute and tell everyone about one of my other passions. In addition to my time in the trenches as a freelance graphic designer and photographer, I also provide 3D animation and video editing to my clients.

Shooting video for a commercial or web promotion is the easy part. The editing, sound and effects are what make the video “pop”. Those elements are key to grabbing a customers attention and holding it. Watch any major movie trailer and you’ll see what I mean. In two or three minutes a good movie trailer has you hooked. At that point you can’t wait for the movie to be released so you can go watch it and eat $10 popcorn. The same principles hold true for any commercial or product spot.

An example of why you should use a professional to edit your video (a professional producer and director are key also), is flow and content. Watch any local TV station commercial produced by the station itself such as car dealer promotions and the like. You’ll see poor acting, terrible script delivery and choppy, hastily edited video. No one pays attention to those commercials. You’re wasting your advertising budget. Now watch a commercial produced by Ford or some major beer company. You’ll see a huge difference and most of the time you won’t flip channels when a professionally produced commercial comes on.

I realize that you probably get the free commercial when you buy air time for your commercial, but what good is free when it’s useless? What good does it do to get a free commercial made when no one will watch it? Why not get a professional to at least consult with you or produce the video for you? Sure, it will cost more than the junk the station provides, but it will work much better. Try it once and you’ll be hooked, providing you’re selling a product or service that someone actually wants or needs.

Here’s a short introduction sting I made for myself. All of this video is computer generated. There are no stock images or video in it. It was produced using a combination of Blender and Adobe After Effects. The final cut and effects we made using Kdenlive in Linux. Take a look and tell me if your local TV station has done anything like this for you.