The Art Of Being Transparent With Your Brand
Transparency in business is becoming quite the art form. In an oversaturated market customers want to support brands whose values…
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5 Amazing Music Videos To Steal Explainer Ideas From
Okay, okay, ‘steal’ is a harsh word. What we’re looking at today are five music videos that contain some great…
The Best Explainer Videos Have These 8 Things In Common
If you want to be successful in anything it’s important – if not vital – to gather the best of…
How To Use Pacing In Your Explainer Animation
Ever notice how a lot of explainer videos keep a fairly bustling pace, right on the verge of what’s comfortable?…
7 Ways To Work Through Creative Problems
Whether you’re a business owner, an agent, or a creative professional, being creatively stumped is a bad place to find…
How To Use The Power Of Nostalgia In Your Explainer Video
It seems like everyone and their grandma is cashing in on the nostalgia boom lately. Meanwhile, it’s hard to throw…
8 ways to make your explainer video ‘pop’
Hey, you with the face! Looking for ways to grab people’s attention with your video content? Wanna’ get an explainer video made but afraid it’s gonna’ get lost amongst a sea of similar videos? Sounds like you need to check out these 8 ways to make your explainer video pop: 1) Have fun with vibrant…
The philosophy behind why we watch videos
Humans. Can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em, can’t read this blog without being one (hyper-intelligent dolphins aside). We’re a weird animal who finds meaning in pondering our own existence, and joy in watching unreal events display to us on very large or very tiny boxes of metal and wires. But why do we…
What makes for an addictive web video?
Having a truly addictive web video on your hands is a gold mine for two reasons. For starters, an addictive video is a rewatchable video, which adds to the view count and visible notoriety of the video. Secondly, an addictive video is more often than not a highly sharable video, making the viral spread of…
The ‘Effing Epic Explanimate Blog Quiz Extravaganza
Hold onto your explainers, optimise your search engines, and blank your blanks because we’re taking an epic look back through our back catalogue of fascinating Explanimate blog articles and dammit, we’re bringing you along for the ride. Remember the time we profiled successful examples of brand videos? Or our epic two-part A to Z guide…
Getting the motivation to make a good explainer video
Motivation: it’s quite literally why we do what we do. In an ideal world we’d have unlimited motivation to achieve our realistic ambitions. But for all us suckers here in the real world, that ain’t the case most of the time. Even when we’re fully aware something will improve our lives – like quitting added…
How important is creativity in business?
It’s easy to think that creativity in the workplace is a luxury only afforded to those working in artistic fields. Heck, here at Explanimate our whole thing is to show off the creative side of your brands and organisations. But even those of us who work in the arts can get bogged down by the…
Here’s How Animation Makes Your Mobile Apps Better
So you wanna’ jump on that mobile app bandwagon. Maybe you want to expand your brand image, or you have a cool new idea for a mobile-based service. Whatever your intentions are with developing an app, the one thing that’s absolutely vital to understand is your user experience design. Yeah, it can feel a little…
How Animation Is Used In Education
The association between animation and kids is strong. Many of us grow up watching cartoons for entertainment, and some of us were sat in front of the TV as youngsters for the mildly reviled ‘educational cartoons’. But the uses of animation for education are far more wide-reaching and a lot more entertaining than many realise,…
Should I Use Fiverr For Explainer Videos?
I mean, it’s a fair question to ask yourself. It’s not like money grows on trees. Perhaps you’ve searched for ‘free explainer video software’ or ‘free explainer video maker’ in the hopes that an app maker has developed the perfect program for you: click a button, put in some details about your brand and boom,…
How Does Animation Affect Our Daily Life?
Let’s be honest here: when someone tells me they don’t watch, don’t like, or don’t have anything to do with animation, I can’t help but look at them with a little side eye. You know, that sidelong squinty-eyed glance of distrust? Yeah. Then I feel a little bad because, hey, it’s not like everyone works…
How Does Animation Reach All 3 Learning Styles?
Do you find you just can’t sit still when trying to learn something? Do you pick up more information from audiobooks than books? Or do you, like me, sleep at night amongst a big pile of graphs, maps, and pie charts? Whether or not you recognise it by name, chances are you’ve probably encountered the…
9 Simpsons Quotes That Explain Branded Animation Perfectly
It’s 6:00 pm in 1990s Australia. You’re either in one of those buttoned-down families who insist on watching the 6 o’clock news every weeknight or, more likely, you’re watching The Simpsons. There are quite literally thousands of classic quotes from the first ten seasons of the long-running primetime animation that get bandied around by Australian…
How To Use Recruitment Videos To Nab Top Employees
In such an oversaturated job market it can be tempting for companies to ask: Do we really need a recruitment campaign at all? The biggest flaw with this thinking is assuming that the best-suited employees will not only magically find your job ad, but that they will automatically want to work for a company they…
Training videos your workers will actually watch
Ah yes, the corporate training video. More ridiculed than the recruitment video, and only slightly less reviled than the school project video. But little do most people know it doesn’t have to be this way. Indeed, your training videos can be eye-catching, funny, or even – dare I say – interesting. Don’t believe it? Check…
Why Is Whiteboard Animation So Damn Popular?
Every couple of years there seems to be a new fad in corporate video. When whiteboard animation first came swaggering onto the scene it too seemed like the kind of phenomenon that would enter with a blaze of glory and fade shortly after with not so much as a whimper. Yet here we are several…
8 Alternatives To YouTube For Explainer Videos
Even in the twilight years of cat videos, vloggers, and ice bucket challenges it can be hard to see how any online video platform could begin to compete with YouTube. As of 2017 their audience numbers were in the range of 1,300,000,000 people. In recent years though we’ve seen the beginning of what may prove…
14 New Year Video Ideas For Your Brand
If you’re lucky, the new year can bring with it new resolutions, a new slate, and new creative ideas. For the rest of us unlucky chumps, the vast opportunity of a new year can bring with it a crippling creative dry spell. A blank page is intimidating, especially when you’re coming up with ideas to…
Why do agencies love animation?
Think about it: how many restaurants do you know that run their own farms? How many plumbers make their own pipes, and how many writers whittle their own pencils? Business partnership benefits everyone in these situations, and it only makes sense that creative and technical fields work by the same principle. That’s why so many…
Hot Trends in Explainer Animation
Whether you’re looking to fit your brand video in with the most successful explainers of late, or you’re looking to find out what’s popular so you can buck the trend, it’s important to know what’s out there, what’s popular, and what’s cliché to the point of staleness. Today we’re looking at just a few of…
How To Brainstorm Like A Pro
Brainstorming: it’s a term that fills some of us with creative energy, and others with a sinking dread only paralleled by hearing the phrase ‘group assignment’ at university. But when you’re looking to develop ideas for your brand’s next video, a team brainstorming session can the innovative, time-saving push you need to get there. So…
How to speak to a Brisbane audience with animation
One of the first things you’ll likely do when planning any sort of business strategy is profile your audience. Who are your target demographics? What are their shared interests? Where do they spend their time? When your audience is defined by the city they live in it can create a clearer picture of the branding…
Good, Cheap, Fast: What should I choose when getting an explainer video made?
Good, cheap, fast. Pick two. It’s the project management triangle, the triple constraint, the two-sentence explanation as to why we can’t always get what we want. In the corporate world, and especially in the world of video production, the quality, cost, and output speed of your project are what determines its ability to go ahead.…
These 5 Classic Writing Tips Can Make Or Break Your Brand Videos
Writing is one of those skills that seeps into almost every other creative pursuit—songs need lyrics, art needs critical interpretation, and videos need scripts. It’s no surprise then that good copywriting is powerful enough to salvage a mediocre project, or destroy an otherwise reasonable one. Over the centuries some well-known ‘best practice’ tips have emerged…
How Animation Could’ve Saved The Most Awkward Government Ad Ever
When the Department of Finance released a three-minute ad for their graduate program in late February, it made headlines. Unfortunately they weren’t the kind of headlines many government departments would want. Indeed, when the extreme awkwardness of The Game Changers spread virally around the interwebs, it left some of us wondering if the production company…
How To Visually Design Your Brand Through Animation
Animation is a visceral visual medium which demands you take control of it. There’s no passive visual elements: you can’t sit a camera down and film whatever happens in front of it. Every element you see on screen is intentionally created and placed. If designers and animators choose their elements so carefully, then how can…
Here’s how an animated explainer video is made
Ever wondered what goes into the making of an animated explainer video? Considering getting one made for your brand but aren’t sure how much control you will or should have? What a coincidence! Today we’re giving you the lowdown on the major steps involved in creating an animated explainer through a production company. Enjoy! 1)…
How to speak to a Sydney audience with animation
Ahh, Sydney. Home of Luna Park, AC/DC, that one revolving restaurant we all deny having dropped a few hundred bucks to eat at, and 42 Wallaby Way. Well, maybe not the last one. With so many recognisable landmarks Sydney is not only the tourism capital of Australia, but also sits among the top-fifteen most visited…
6 questions you should ask before developing an explainer video for your brand
One of the best pieces of advice I’ve heard if you’re considering taking up a new hobby is to Google, “Things I wish I’d known before trying [hobby]”. This is a quick way to scope out potential downsides you may not have previously considered. Likewise before undertaking a new project, whether creative or corporate, it’s…
How to speak to a Melbourne audience with animation
Whether it’s dodging the crowds at the night noodle markets, putting your hand on the water wall at the art gallery, or practicing your contained look of disgust for next time you have to travel to Sydney, there are a whole host of cultural phenomena that draw Melbourne-dwellers together. (Melbournians? Melbournites? Melbunnies? Yeah… let’s go…
7 videos to check out if you’re considering explainer animation
Trying to find useful content on a topic you’re new to can be like finding a needle in a haystack. And when that topic is something as over-saturated as online video, suddenly the haystack becomes an overgrown hedge maze and the needle is a contact lens you lost three years ago which may or may…
Why animated video is the future of advertising
Every week some chump on the internet writes a new article about ‘why blank is the future of BLANK!’ and the 10 ways kale actually grants you the power of time travel. Well strap yourselves in, because today that chump is us. Minus the kale. Okay, maybe a little bit of kale. We’re talking about…
Does your explainer video have purpose?
There’s a quote from German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche that goes, “He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.” What’s interesting about this quote is how it can apply not just to our lives, our psychological state, and our most basic response to the human condition… but also to explainer videos.…
Make Social Media Work For Your Branded Videos
Social media allows us to do two things with great efficiency: create and share content, and network with other users socially. Given how important both these tasks are in business networking it’s no wonder corporate presence is so ubiquitous across the social media landscape. These days if you’ve got something to share for your business,…
12 resources for promoting your brand with animation
Whenever I’m considering buying a new product, the first place I hit is Google. User reviews, forums, product descriptions and video tutorials combined usually give a pretty comprehensive idea of whether I’ll find the item useful. But when it comes to niche B2B services like corporate animation it can be harder to find such useful…
What we can learn from 4 successful animated videos
There’s a famous quote attributed to Groucho Marx that says: “You must learn from the mistakes of others. You can’t possibly live long enough to make them all yourself.” As much as it’s useful (and secretly fun) to observe the mistakes of others, often we can learn even more by studying their successes. Looking at…
4 Mistakes To Avoid In Your Corporate Video
Large, expensive mistakes are often more effective teachers than small, affordable ones. But at the end of the day, who wants to throw away their money and time on a poor decision? Nobody. And don’t be fooled when people tell you “nobody’s perfect”, because that ‘nobody’ guy really likes to talk himself up. He’s far…
What to look for when engaging an animation production house
Finding the right animation production house for your corporate video is a bit like managing a county fair pony. There can be a lot riding on it, and a ton of crap to sift through. But wading through the piles of faceless animation studios can become faster, easier and less daunting when you’ve got a…
How to advertise a startup through animation
What exactly is a startup? Everyone and their mother seems to have their own definition. Some define it as a new business designed for rapid growth, others consider technological innovation as key in identifying a startup, while others believe it describes the opening phases of what may become a larger company. Whatever your definition, it’s…
How To Represent Your Brand Through Animation
From the layout of your website to the exact dimensions of a billboard to your employee’s shirt colour, branding decisions encompass almost every aspect of a business. More than ever we’re ‘meeting’ a brand in the virtual world long before ever stepping foot in a physical store. So when we talk about how to effectively…
The Video Compression Cheat Sheet
If you’ve ever produced a digital video of any kind, you’ll know the feeling of satisfaction you get from finally completing a great-looking film. And most likely, you’ll also know the feeling of intimidation, frustration and/or seething rage when first confronted with the huge selection of video render settings. I hear you: ‘All I want…
4 Underused Techniques to Make Your Animation Unique
When it comes to the creative arts, popular techniques often become popular for a reason. Sometimes these techniques are proven to bring about a particular emotional response from an audience, or are known to work well with an efficient production pipeline—whatever the result, there is a solid reason they’re so commonly used in their field.…
We don’t just animate, we illustrate!
We often get asked the question…”Do you guys create illustrations as well as animations?” The answer… of course! Every animation needs to be illustrated before it can be animated after all. Here’s an example of a corporate illustration we created for one of our clients – Plant Assessor. A Christmas Card for their clients 🙂
Merry Christmas ya Filthy Animal!
Here’s hoping you’re a Home Alone fan and get the above! OK lets not waste too much of your time, short of wishing all our client, friends, colleagues, and hey… even our enemies, a beautiful Christmas with family and friends. If you’d like to see some of the stuff we’ve done this year, check it…
The Art of Designing Appealing Characters for Your Animation
Spend long enough talking to animators and you’ll start to hear the word ‘appeal’ come up. In terms of animated characters, appeal is what makes an audience see the character as charismatic or realistic. It’s what makes us feel for them, and remember them, even after the animation is over. Creating appeal comes from not…
How to check the popularity of your animated video
If you read our previous article on how to make your company’s animated video stand out, you’ll know that getting your video in front of eyeballs can be a challenging and oft times hit-and-miss process. But when you start to notice interest picking up, how do you truly get an idea of your video’s effectiveness?…
What To Do When You Can’t Think Of Any Marketing Video Ideas
We’ve all been there. You sit down in front of your computer/notebook/carrier pigeon ready and raring to fire out some ideas. Why, just last night you had about fifty-seven brilliant ideas right when you were trying to go to sleep. You can’t remember any of them now, but hey, that’s fine. Coming up with ideas…
How to make your company’s explainer video stand out
So you’ve gone and got a shiny new explainer video for your company. The production company was great to work with, and the animation looks sleek and professional. The business message comes across perfectly, and once people see this they’ll be clambering for your company’s products and services. So… what now? While developing an effective…
The A-Z Guide to Digital Animation Terminology – Part Two: N-Z
Last time in the A-Z guide we delved into all things digital-ish and animation-y in the first half of the alphabet, from Alpha Channels to Mask Layers. Today we’ll be concluding our A-Z guide focussing on technical terms and how they apply to the world of digital animation by looking at some common and not-so-common…
The A-Z Guide to Digital Animation Terminology – Part One: A-M
Whether you’re a hobbyist animator looking to improve your scope of knowledge, an agency exec wanting a clearer idea of the technical terms your contracted animators use, or a freelancing client who has no idea what H.264 is and what it has to do with your small business animation, an A to Z guide is…
Do I really NEED an explainer video? The Pros and Cons
Ah, pros and cons lists. The best friend of the blog writer, the secret lover of the indecisive, and the arch enemy of people who hate trying to draw straight lines on a pad of paper. We could sit here all day and talk about the pros and cons of pros and cons lists, but…
Why it pays for Agencies to partner with an Animation Production House
If there’s one thing people in the animation industry do well, it’s teamwork. Creating a professional animated product is a group effort that often takes an astounding amount of collaboration and an understanding of how each individual effort fits into the larger picture as a whole. Knowing this, it comes as no surprise that many…
4 Myths About Animation (and the truth)
Overgeneralising is a quick way to get yourself into trouble these days. Try to summarise a political party by using a single politician as an example, and people around you will quickly see your ignorance is showing. Tell a bunch of metalheads what the metal genre is like because you heard one Metallica track about…
5 ways to make music work for your animated video
Music is undoubtedly one of the most pervasive creative forces in our lives. Jump on any bus or train and you’ll find a handful of passengers sporting headphones. Walk through any shopping centre and you’ll hear a bland fusion of unthreatening pop tunes coming from every different supermarket, jeans store and $2 shop where they…
Why Animation?
Animations have been entertaining people for years with clever use of creativity, humour and so much more. What started out with just pencil to paper has become one of the most popular sources of entertainment and methods for companies to communicate to clients, thanks to technology and the internet. Animation dares to go where live…
How the animated film landscape will look in the next 20 years (Part 2)
Last month we looked at some predictions for the future of animated film, both in Australia and worldwide. This month we’re delving into the two other major outlets for animated media: our old pal television, and our new, very rich and therefore very attractive pal, corporate animation. Let’s get cracking: 1. Streaming services will offer…
3D Printing & The Future of Animation
How best to describe the industry of animation, in the last twenty years? Turbulent. Turbulent and ever-changing. Animation, from the inside, is all about life and art – this is what we tell ourselves as artists, anyway– but from the outside, animation is led by technology. Advanced technology itself has evolved faster in the last…
How the animated film landscape will look in the next 20 years (Part 1)
Have you ever read an article from the 1960’s which tried to predict the wonders of the future? We’ve all had a substantial giggle at the unfulfilled prophecies of living on the moon, or having a whole eight computers gracing the entire globe. Well get ready to laugh, computer-starved moon dwellers, because I have some…
Awesome new animation for Bowerbid!!
It’s been a busy year once again at Explanimate! We’ve worked with some great clients and produced some great work that we’re really proud of. Here is one we are particularly proud of; it’s the corporate animation we made for Bowerbid. We had a great time working on this and utilising some more advanced techniques…
Decorating our new office…..
Explanimate recently moved into a new office. Once the renovations we’re done we decided to draw all over the walls. Check it out and tell us what you think!
Five Fantastic Reasons for Using Explainer Videos
There was a great article published towards the end of last year about the benefits of Explainer videos. You can check out the full article here. And here are the main points for those who want everything right now: 1. Explainer Videos Are the New User Manuals When introducing or demonstrating the features and benefits…
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from Explanimate!
We’d just like to take some timeout, to wish all of our clients, partners, friends and family a Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year. 2013 has been a big year for us, creating a lot of new content, exploring some new styles, and making lots of new friends along the way. We’re looking forward…
Behind the Scenes: Whiteboard Animation
There is a lot of buzz at the moment about whiteboard animation. Everyone does it differently so we thought we’d show you how we created the PCG animation. While we were working on the video, Travis grabbed a DSLR to capture a peek at how we work. Check out the behind the scenes video and…
Techcrunch article: Rise of the ‘explainer’ video…
We missed this a few weeks ago when it was posted but this is a great article about ‘explainer’ videos. They make a lot of good points about why explainer videos are becoming increasingly relevant and offer some tips on what makes a good explainer video. Check it out.
Dealpinch-Daily deals delivered daily! (say that 5 times fast!)
When Lucy from Dealpinch approached us to make a video for her site we were honored. Dealpinch is a site that gives you all the best daily deals on your terms. The challange: Make a fun and engaging video that demonstrates the awesomeness of Dealpinch (including all the ways you can access the site), use…
Check out the explainer we did for Kondoot!!
When an up and coming social video start up asks you to make a video for them you say sweet. When they they tell you it needs to be completed in 48 hours you say sweet….damn. This is exactly what happened last Friday when we were asked to complete a full explainer by Sunday night.…