In our final member feature article of 2023 we are spotlighting animation. The pandemic prompted a huge rise in the popularity of animation, and agencies have taken it from strength to strength since. Animation is such a broad space, tapping into a huge range of techniques from motion graphics to VFX, character-led animation to the more traditional. In true reflection of the diverse possibilities of animation, our members sent us animations that tackle mental health, ensure safety and get up close with zombies!
Read about, and watch, the featured projects below:
Synima explores mental health and the root of presenting problems
Unlike current mental health animations circulating on social media our animations focus of the roots of presenting problems rather than just how to cope with them. They are peer reviewed by psychiatrists and professional institutions such as UCL. These (completely free) animations have been downloaded over 250,000 times which demonstrate the demand for professional information. The feedback we receive is applied to subsequent iterations of the topic e.g. this ‘Childhood Animation’ evolved from a prior ‘Anxiety’ animation. As the frontiers of mental health treatment expand so do our animations.
Childhood Anxiety
We live in a culture that is beginning to take mental health issues more seriously. A lot of stigma and shame results. People struggle with well-meaning advice such as ‘suck it up’, or ‘get it together’, or to ‘stop worrying’, or that it’s ‘all in your head’. Anxiety is real, it lies on a spectrum and can be the precursor to a wide range of comorbidities such as substance abuse.
This animation doesn’t just address the causes of anxiety. It frames issues such as hypervigilance during childhood in an accessible way through using an octopus as a metaphor for a person’s anxiety. This animation hopes to start a conversation around the nature of anxiety. And to reassure those who struggle with anxiety that a ‘solution’ can be worked towards
Anger
‘Understanding Anger’ is the first in a series of animations which has been made available to anyone and everyone seeking to understand and rationalise their feelings and behaviour. It was produced for student services to help with violence between children and against TA’s.
Using ‘digital cel’ – this VEGA Centauri Award winning animation unravels the complexity of why we express ‘anger’ and what the trade-off cost is of this self-soothing technique to ourselves and others. With young people especially effected by soaring mental illness, ‘Understand your Anger’ has been made available online so it is easily accessible to mental health charities and educational establishments.
Kaptcha portray real threats to the defence sector
‘Delivering the Mission’ is a corporate video that introduced the ‘why’ of the BAE Systems Digital Intelligence to an international audience on the defence sector. As a recently-formed business within BAE Systems. Digital Intelligence needed to show how their gold standard integration of real-time data – a digital thread – enables clients to make critical decisions in live operations with confidence. Kaptcha decided to bring the digital thread to life by creating a hyper world. A world that DI’s clients would immediately identify with, placing them and DI at the heart of the drama.
The film portrays the full narrative of a real threat as it unfolds. Digital threads become graphically-rendered forms roving through multi-layered action, sometimes moving extremely fast, sometimes frozen in time.
‘Delivering the Mission’ achieved over 1 million video impressions (1,020,143) across all platforms. On LinkedIn it attracted over 33,000 organic views, substantially higher than other videos for BAE Systems. There have been over 270 reactions to the main film, 57% above average for DI videos.
Pukka Films address security issues in civil aviation
The Threat to Civil Aviation series was 6 films (8-12 minutes each) that were used by DfT trainers around the world to address security issues related to terrorism and criminality.
The client wanted a 3D animated approach in order to be able to create a generic airport that could be anywhere in the world and to get around the issues of representation and diversity. The approach also allowed us to adapt the films for different markets by swapping out characters to have characters more representative of the local audience.
The film was dubbed, subtitled and had its on-screen graphics changed into 13 languages.
Following on from delivery of the first six films, we were then commissioned to produce a further six films for the aviation security client and four films along the same lines for a maritime security client at the DfT.
RD Content create a zombie-filled trailer
Deep in the desert of post-apocalyptic Arizona, a lone hero confesses his sins to … a zombie? Jam-packed with guns, guts, and gore, Arizona Sunshine 2 is Vertigo Games’ hotly anticipated sequel to one of VR’s most-played titles. With a formal announcement destined for this year’s Sony Showcase, our team had a challenging 8 week turnaround that demanded heaps of effort across both disciplines and timezones. We worked primarily in the cutting-edge Unreal Engine 5, as our talented group of animators, modellers, compositors, and editors dedicated everything they could to make this trailer as emphatic as possible. It is safe to say the hard work paid off, as the trailer was met with an exceptional in-person reception and also garnered 135k views online.
Watch the trailer here: https://neverdarkstudio.com/arizona-sunshine-2
Look behind the scenes here: https://app.frame.io/reviews/c5f6a3f1-31d1-4e43-9531-c8916eee5258/537f7ef5-e877-467d-81bd-063928b648eb
CH Video create the full genre of animation available
Only five years ago, animation and motion graphics comprised around 40% of the work we produced in video. That’s now closer to 80% – viewers want to be engaged with nicely-designed moving visuals, character animation, stop-motion styles and kinetic, eyeball-satisfying graphics. We use the full genre of animation available to us these days to deliver tell stats and stories and they always create the ‘wow’ we want.
Find out more: https://www.ch-video.com/work/ch-video-motion-graphics
Thank you to everyone who contributed to our final member feature article of 2023!