We’re in the motion graphics age. As we continue to move towards a more digital world, the use of motion graphics has become increasingly popular. This is because motion graphics can be used to communicate messages more effectively than traditional forms of communication. In this blog post, we will discuss the basics of motion graphics and provide some best practices for creating effective motion graphics videos. Stay tuned!
Why Motion Graphics?
All right, so repeat after me: Use motion to make more money. And again: Use motion to make more money. One last time: Use motion to make more money.
There’s a lot of money in motion design, and that’s because the industry is booming. It’s in its infancy and it is a growing trend that is only going to get more and more popular. If you’re not at least selling this, then you should actually explore the possibility of learning this skill.
One way or another, whether you learn the skill or sell it, this is something you should definitely be looking at. So today, I’m going to talk about motion design and how you can leverage it in your graphic design business or web design business. All right, so if you stay with me until the end of this article, I’m going to show you some really neat ways to actually make thousands of dollars.
You can add thousands of dollars of revenue to your business using motion design without any motion design skills now. You’ll need to know some basic things and I’m going to cover those in this article, but motion design is a hot trending thing right now. There’s a lot of demand for it so, if you can leverage this and hang with me to the end of the article, I’ll give you some of these secrets. The first thing you need to master – and this is really important – is to understand what motion graphics are.
What Are Motion Graphics?
What is motion design? Motion design is animating graphical images on a timeline. It’s actually animating a photo or an image that you’ve created on your computer and animating that, putting motion into it. Motion graphic designers are the ones who do this and they’re also known as motion designers, not just motion graphic designers but motion designers. There are a lot of them out there and it’s growing very quickly.
They actually animate graphics for web pages, for television, and for films. This is something that you see in our videos all the time – the pop-ups, the little animations. You can get stock ones or you can create your own from scratch, but this is a really important thing that is happening more and more and more. And this is something that you should be able to leverage. So I want to know who’s reading this article.
Are you a motion graphic designer? If you are, introduce yourself! Adrian Agency is not just for graphic designers but motion graphic designers and web designers too. And I want to be able to meet you if you’re a motion designer. We’re looking to expand our team, and we’d love to have you in our community. Reach out and let us know, or join the Instagraphics community!
What Types of Motion Graphics Are the Biggest in the Industry?
The second piece to this is really important, and I put the bulk of my research and time into it because I wanted you to walk away with something tangible. We need to understand what type of motion design work is going to be big, and what skills a motion designer needs to have in order to be successful. Whether you’re hiring somebody or learning the skills yourself, it’s important to have a basic understanding of this.
So I’m going to give you three types of motion design work that I think are going to be big going forward, and then I’m going to give you some of the understanding of what type of skill sets that person needs in order to do this type of work.
NFTs
Now, number one is a really big deal, and it’s only going to get bigger. It really relies on the branding of the project, but it’s NFTs or non-fungible tokens. If you’re not familiar with what an NFT is you should probably read this article so you can get a basic understanding. This is a huge, trending area right now that’s related to cryptocurrency; it has a lot of popularity and hype, and with the good campaigns if you can actually put some motion to them – which is what some of the work that we’ve done recently has revolved around.
Unfortunately, I can’t talk about those because of NDAs. But if you animate some of these NFTs, you can add even more value to them. Post them on social media, and this adds a lot of value to the projects. I think Beeple’s done animations, too. Many of these big NFTs actually have motion graphics to them now. So motion design or animation falls into the same category. But that’s the first one that I really wanted you to know and really take into consideration.
Explainer Videos
The second one is probably where we’ve generated the most amount of revenue as a company so far. Up to this point, explainer videos have been a big part of our business. I personally love explainer videos and you can find people on Fiverr and other websites who will do cheap whiteboard versions of them. But if you want a motion designer with the skill sets like Ian’s, you’re going to have to pay a higher price.
We create the scripts, we create the storyboards, we create the actual animation, and we create the assets for it. Somebody who can do all of that stuff can start and finish those projects, and they’re worth a lot of money. They range anywhere from on the low side – I think the lowest we’ve ever done one for is around $3,600 – to up to $15-$20,000 at the highest. I’m sure they could go even higher if you’re doing even longer videos.
Explainer videos are basically just walking a customer or client through the journey of something you’re trying to explain. These are becoming more and more popular, and I see the trend rising; I see that there’s going to be even more of that type of work coming in the future, so this is something you should really consider if you’re looking to get into motion design. Creating explainer videos and marketing them to your existing clients is a great idea now.
Kinetic Typography
The last one is one of my favorites, and that is kinetic typography. I really love kinetic typography. Ian is super gifted at that; he’s done a lot of really cool work. That was actually when he sent me over his initial reel, and I was going to look to hire somebody that had a lot of that in their portfolio.
So I think you need to look for that as well. It’s a popular trend I think kinetic typography kind of started back in the day with the music videos that were on YouTube and people putting moving text to the videos. That’s kind of elevated now, the typography moves in different directions and stacks and you can do so many neat things. We did one for a church campaign that I thought was really neat where there was a lot of kinetic typography.
It’s just animated text basically that is animating in different ways – it flips, spins, and goes at different angles. I think this is going to be even more popular going forward – it’s really entertaining and fun to watch. It doesn’t really take as much work as an explainer video does.
Animated Logos
There are more than eight different types of projects that you can do, and stuff that we’ve done is one type of project. Another type of project that I wanted to mention is animated logos. Animated logos are awesome because they have a high demand.
This is how I would personally introduce it to my clients in the past: by offering them free animated logos when they buy a logo design or do some sort of project with me. I’ll just give them an animated logo, and I use some different things to do that. For example, Ian will do them or we have software that I’m going to talk about here in just a minute that you can use to actually introduce animations and motion design to your clients.
What Skills Should Every Designer Making Motion Graphics Have?
This is a list of the skill sets that you have because there’s a lot here and I just can’t remember all of them off the top of my head, so I’m going to go ahead and grab my phone and I’m going to read these off to you. So, some of the skills that you need to have if you’re a motion designer.
2D or 3D Modeling
Number one is 2D or 3D modeling. Whether you’re doing flat design or you’re doing 3D design, those are totally different skill sets. Not every motion designer is going to be able to do 3D and not everyone’s going to be able to do 2D. Some are going to lean more towards 3D and some are going to lean more towards 2D. I think in our experiences we like to do more 2D. I think it’s more applicable; it’s a little bit more simple. When choosing between 2D and 3D modeling, you need to have a basic understanding of the differences and the different skills involved.
Perspective
The second thing here is the animated perspective or animation perspective. What is the angle or the camera angle and understanding the perspective of the animation and how that’s going to look on screen? So if you’re trying to do a really wide-angle shot and you don’t have the right tools for it or you don’t understand how to set that up in your scene, it’s not going to look good. So having a basic understanding of perspective is important.
Organization
Number three is an organization. One thing I’ve noticed, and the reason why I don’t think I could be a very good motion designer, is that you have to be extremely organized with your files and your timelines and your assets, and everything linking together. There are so many things to organize, and then you have scripts and you have storyboards. There’s a lot to organize and a lot to keep track of.
For me, I get really overwhelmed with the complexity that I see happening in motion design and tracking things on a timeline and all of the little details that I forget. The marks they put in there on the timeline can be a lot to keep track of, so you have to be well organized and able to organize your projects correctly. This is a really important skill that I think every motion designer needs to have.
Procedural Animation
Number four is procedural animation. Procedural animation is a way of making things move without having to animate them frame by frame. You can use expressions in After Effects or some of the tools in Cinema 4D or Maya to do this. It makes your life a lot easier as a motion designer. I’m not saying that you should never do keyframe animation because there are certain things that need to be keyframed, but if you can procedural animate something it just saves you so much time and it looks really good.
Texturing and Lighting Effects
Number five is texturing and lighting effects. I think this is really cool. This is an area that I saw Ian was jumping into, was more of the textures and learning how to put textures on his stuff, rather than just being flat colors or gradient colors. I think it adds a lot of depth to motion design, and if this is something that you want to implement, you need to make sure that your motion designer, that you’re hiring or the skill sets that you’re going after, is something that you can actually incorporate into your stuff because I think it makes a big difference as well as lighting.
Timing
Number six is about understanding the timing of this and how you’re going to track along the storyboard and understanding the context of it. Timing is a really big deal when it comes to animation – moving too slow or too fast can ruin the effect you’re going for. There’s a lot that we could go into with timing, but I think these are important elements you need to think of.
Contextual Storytelling
And then the last one is contextual storytelling. Every project that we do, whether it’s an NFT explainer video, a commercial, whatever, we’re always thinking about the context and what the objective is. You want to make sure that the motion designer understands the storytelling aspect and the entire goal of the project. Everything should be cohesive – the brand should match.
Template Websites for Logo Motion Graphics
Make sure that you understand all of those seven skills if you’re going to offer this to your clients because you want to make sure you’re giving them the best bang for their buck. The last phase is what you’ve been waiting for, and this is where I told you if you read until the end of the article, I’m going to give you some gold nuggets. These are coming here, and this is monetizing this booming niche. Motion design is a booming niche where it’s still in its infancy; it hasn’t been around as long as graphic design and video production.
It’s really an emerging trend and emerging area that I think you guys should be taking advantage of and I want to see more motion designers put to work and people jumping into the industry. If you’re a seasoned graphic designer, this may be the perfect thing for you to add to your tool belt, and I want to encourage you. If this is something that interests you and you’re curious about it, you should definitely take a look. So let me give you some resources real quick that I think will help you out.
How to Monetize Motion Graphics
Now, if you actually want to monetize this, you need to get the word out to your clients. So, I’m going to give you three things that you can do to get the word out to your clients. Start to monetize motion design within your own business by using templated samples, outsourcing work, or learning motion design.
Motion Graphics Samples
The first one I already mentioned is creating a logo animation for free, using software like Videobolt, Renderforest, or Animaker. So there are three options for you right there, but I think VideoBolt is the strongest one. They have a large gallery and their stuff is very affordable.
So we have one of their paid membership plans and if we just need to knock out a quick logo animation, that’s what we use because you pay one flat fee and you can do pretty much as many videos as you want, I think, on their larger plans. So this is something that I would consider doing logo animations for your clients and just sending that to them for free and doing the value add.
It could seem a bit strange, but it’s an excellent way to start off a conversation about motion design by handing out this business card. It is not uncommon for people who don’t ask for what they don’t pay for to accept it as a thank-you gift without requesting anything in return. But you’re giving it to them as an added bonus because they did business with you and it’s a fantastic approach to open up the discussion and get started on a conversation about movement design.
Outsource Motion Graphics to Experts
The second way is something that I really want to encourage you to take into consideration: send us your motion design work. Ian and I have been working really hard for the last couple of years to build this channel, to build our team, to build our processes and systems; and we’ve reached that place now where we’re ready to take on a ton of motion design work – even going so far as to bring in other motion designers.
That’s why I wanted you guys to introduce yourselves if you do motion design. So if you’re looking to get motion design work done and you want somebody you can trust, send it to us. Not only are you going to get the work done the right way, but we also offer an agency-to-agency or creative-to-creative pricing structure that is very affordable for you.
Then you can take that and mark it up for your clients and make a really nice profit. How good does that sound? So if you’re interested in that, I’m going to put a link down in the description to reach out to us and send us your motion design work. This is a really good way to get started right out of the gate. All right, so now that comes to our last one.
Learn to Create Motion Graphics
The last way to monetize the motion design niche and incorporate that into your business is to learn it yourself. But where do you start? Where do you begin? How do you start learning the skill? Well, I’m sure you could go watch videos on YouTube. That’s a good way to start. There are probably people out there that you can learn from. Maybe even some experts that you already know. But I really want to encourage you to make an investment in yourself.
School of Motion: A Great Place to Learn Motion Graphics
If this is something you’re really interested in make the investment and check out School of Motion. This is a really good academy. It’s a really good platform. A really good program. Ian’s done a couple of courses inside of this. I think we paid for explainer camp, which teaches you a lot of the fundamentals and knowledge you need to know about explainer videos. So if you’re planning on going out and doing explainer videos for people, I would really encourage you to check out the School of Motions’ explainer camp. There are some other ones that you can learn about texturing and lighting and kinetic typography.
They have so much to offer and I’m not paid or endorsed by them in any way, but I really believe in what they’re doing and I want to support them. My fellow creatives in the industry should see them continue to grow; it’s going to help you make the investment in yourself. Don’t be afraid – they offer payment plans. There’s no reason why you shouldn’t be able to do this. Ian’s done it, and I’m probably going to do some stuff just so I can sharpen my skills as well.
I just really want to encourage you guys that this is an area that you find interesting, and could give you a unique angle compared to all your competitors. Which is why I created this. I really want to encourage you either start doing some logo animations with the software I gave you, send us some of your work, or check out School of Motion – they’ll give you everything you could possibly need.
Final Thoughts on Motion Graphics
So that’s it for today. If you have any questions about motion design, or you want to get some motion design work done, let me know. Otherwise, I’ll see you guys in the article. Thank you so much for reading, and I’ll see you next time. As always, keep looking up!