Animations have become the new standard for sharing high-level product information, and businesses are increasingly using animation to share, design, and deploy full manufacturing assembly lines.
However, you cannot rely on 2D animation to convey what you’re creating, especially when there are so many readily available and usable 3D animation and modeling tools that can transform your designs into computer-screen models that tell the entire story.
A 3D industrial animation depicts an industrial machine or product, as well as its specific mechanism and/or range of motion. Its goal is to explain the operation of an industrial product, mechanism, or component.
It’s critical, especially for complex, technical topics, to keep your message as simple as possible. Luckily, 3D animations are ideal for simplifying communication, engaging your audience, explaining a tool, or providing a clear understanding of your product.
3D Engineering Animation can simplify complex concepts and convey complex manufacturing processes that would be difficult to visualize otherwise.
Preparing a 3D animation video, like product development, follows a systematic procedure that ensures the creation of a high-quality and effective animated product video. The following is a list of the essential steps that must be taken when using 3D animation in engineering services.
Project brief
Understanding the customer’s needs is critical to the success of any Product animation. As a result, you must prepare a project brief that highlights the product’s necessary attributes and applications.
An effective animation brief includes a project overview and scope, visuals, style, goals and objectives, target audience, key dates, deliverables, budget, examples of existing designs, and finally, advice on what to avoid.
The briefing process also allows you to predict how a video will perform before it is finished and shown to the audience.
Everything that is outlined and everything that is overlooked during this stage will have irreversible consequences for all subsequent stages of video production.
To write an effective brief, you must first understand the purpose of the video, who the target audience is, and what key message the client wishes to convey.
When an animation brief template is finished, we will schedule a call with the client to go over the main points of the brief and outline the main accents and animation video messages.
Develop a script and storyboard
Once the requirement is understood, a detailed script and storyboard are created based on the data gathered.
The script is a critical component in creating a great explainer video. The key is to present the message to your target audience in the simplest, most comprehensive way possible.
A storyboard is used to pre-visualize the script after it has been finalized. The goal of storyboarding is to go over the flow animation sequences and add or remove any sequences before starting the actual work.
Any element can interact with another, and the storyboard is where you can plan out the impact you want to make on the audience.
Rig a model
3D rigging, in its most basic form, is the process of creating a skeleton for a 3D model so that it can move. Typically, the animator carefully selects and rigs the model to make it easier to work on the animation tool.
Although rigging is most commonly associated with character animation, the same tools are directly applicable to complex mechanical objects and assemblies.
The quality of the rigging phase in the animation pipeline is entirely responsible for achieving smooth and complex animations.
A good rig should be as automated as possible to reduce animator overhead. Furthermore, the assembly must move realistically and remain in proper alignment.
Finally, creating an animator-friendly rig will aid in the reduction of the animation to a set of controls that the animator will manipulate.
Start shooting
Once the model has been rigged, the camera angle is set for different sequences, and the animation flow is created in the 3D platform.
All of the flow simulations allow designers and engineers to make changes to the model as needed.
Furthermore, by animating these qualities and quantities, users can understand how products or entire assemblies will perform in real-world scenarios and detect defects before they go into production.
Add textures, color schemes, and start rendering
This is the most important and time-consuming step in any animation process. Once the preview video has been reviewed and approved by the client. The actual colors and textures of all components have been determined.
Texturing is a particularly important step in the 3D animation process. All of the finer details of characters in 3D animation are the result of a 3D artist applying texture.
In a 3D environment, texture can also give the observer a sense of the material of an object. Just by looking at these objects, viewers should be able to tell what they are made of.
Rendering, on the other hand, is the process of extracting the final assembled animation scenes or pieces from the computer as a sequence of individual frames. Rendering’s goal is to create a series of individual pixel-based frames or a video clip.
Post-production
After the renders are completed, the production process will shift to post-production, where artists will add the finishing touches to the scenes.
The project’s final touches are applied at this stage to make it look polished and professional. Post-production artists have a variety of tools at their disposal to create the look of a project in any way they see fit.
In this step, the animation process typically includes compositing, 2D VFX, and color correction.
Finally, revisions are made and new results are delivered based on the client’s reaction and feedback. The 3D product animation video is now complete and ready for distribution.
Final words
When sharing details with non-engineering team members, animations are especially important. They can tell more detailed stories about a product’s form and function than still images or CAD models can.
A 3D engineering animation is a powerful tool that can help you or your customers showcase the functionality and highlights of your products in the most impressive way possible.
Furthermore, these 3D animated visuals can be rotated and disassembled, allowing mechanical engineers to better explain assembly and demonstrate functionality.
Using the right 3D animation tool will expand your options, make your job easier, and leave your clients much more satisfied that they comprehend the entire engineering process.
