We recently had the opportunity to work with some neighbors of ours, Farmers Almanac TV on one of their new show segments. Since we’ve begun the process of “greening” our practice, the theme of this particular segment, Home ECOnomics, was quite close to our hearts. It’s hosted by Melaver, Inc.’s Head of Sustainable Initiatives, Tommy Linstroth.

I know I’m late but I just saw this Justin Timberlake video and was floored by the sleek use of a simple visual device: The audio waveform in black space. This literally gives you an idea of what the song looks and feels like and it managed to keep my attention all the way up to that end part.

Anyone know who did this?

Just found this magazine’s site while perusing Inc.com’s best 30 under 30 list.
In a media landscape saturated with all that’s bad in the world, it’s refreshing to find an outlet that’s out to project the Good News.
I especially liked this piece of motion graphics on the U.N. Millenium Declaration. Subtle and informative, played over an African track with voice over by former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, this piece underscores the theme of the magazine and web site; as the site itself says, it’s “media for people who give a damn.”

Here’s a great example of the power of motion. The ability to transform sketches and prose into a reenactment so vivid you understand the emotions of the text more clearly.

Found via adgoodness and zinzi_linkz

The text was written by Colby Buzzell, the drawings by Christopher Koelle and the amazing animation by The Law of Few.

During the Inspire 07 conference, some friends, who are also motion graphics artists, and I were drooling (as usual) over the great work being shown. But we were differing in our opinions on what factors helped make them so good. Obviously it’s a combination of several conditions, but which ones do you feel are more important than others? Some of the ones we discussed were:

Geography – There were exclusively NY and LA studios presenting at the conference and quite frankly we weren’t surprised. Since I’ve gotten bitten by the mogra bug, I’ve heard that in order to go anywhere in this industry I had to go to one of two places. Does the concentration of the HQ talent pool in larger markets (particularly NY and LA) increase the stakes, allowing competition to drive the standard of work up exponentially more than in smaller markets? I’m of the opinion that location doesn’t matter but I couldn’t deny the challenge it’s been getting the kind of projects we would like here. Is it any easier in places where high quality work is the norm?

(more…)

The aim of the Inspire07 symposium, held this past Friday, was to spur the attendants on to higher heights of creativity and I’d say “mission accomplished.” There was a lot of emphasis on the artistic side of this art form we call motion graphics, which was good since I tend to get bogged down with the technical how-to’s of the tools. I wanted to touch on a few of the themes that stood out to me.
(more…)