Animation is always exciting to watch. Whether it’s the kickass action in Kung Fu Panda or the adorable fire-breathing dragons in How to Train your Dragon or the amazing underwater life in Finding Nemo, we just can’t seem to get enough. There’s a lot of work that goes into creating even a single scene in an animated explainer, let alone the entire video. So here is a step-by-step process of how to create animated explainer videos.
1. Doodle-Schmoodle (Storyboard)
You know how a concept/script forms the foundation of an entire video? The storyboard forms the basis of the visuals in an animated video. It’s generally a set of hand-drawings that show you the sequence of scenes that will form the video.
2. What’s that noise in the back? (Voice Over)
The voice over is generally created either before or after the storyboard is created. It sets the pace of the video and helps adjust scenes to the timing during the final edit.
3. Now doodle in 2-D (Illustrations)
Illustrations include aspects of both design and layout. This is the part where the characters are created in different angles and poses, the props or the elements are designed, colors and texture are added, the background sets are created and camera angles are decided.
4. Jiggle and squiggle (Rigging)
Now you have all these characters and properties in place but how do you make the character move the way you want it to? For making the character walk, move his arms about or even tilt his head or shrug his shoulders, one needs to know where his arms or legs will bend. You don’t need to study the human skeletal structure but only a little attention to detail will do.
5. The Reel Deal (Animation)
This is the time we come to the actual animation part. It’s where all these things pop in and pop out, props move, characters move, expressions are added and what not.
6. Editor’s Cut (Final Edit)
One last edit needs to be done before the video is actually ready. This is when the voice over is added and the scenes are all put together. You could even add a little jingle in the back along with sound effects.
Next we render the video and Voila! We’ve got you a splendid animated explainer video.