We’re finally here! The very last blog post detailing the ins and outs of the WunderTRE(k) Brandfomercial. We told you we could talk about it forever and now forever is here. And we don’t want to talk about it any more! haha! Just kidding! I do have to say the blogging has been rigorous. So check out the ad before we jump into the motion graphics portion of the project. 

Enter Motion Graphics

The motion graphics on this production were a little challenging, but overall, really fun to tackle. They were created in the order they play in the ad, so first on the list was the “Step by Step Approach” followed by the “See What Efforts Work for Your Business”, then the “Which Ones Work Against You.” These graphics were pretty fun to create! We already had the PDF of the board designed by Matt at WunderTRE, so it was just a matter of animating it drive the points home. I think it’s already been said a LOT in the various blogs for this project, but sound played a HUGE part. The motion graphics for the video did well, but sound really drove them home and actually this particular set is one of Matt’s favorites, when the check mark animates in and the voice says, “YES!” Sometimes the simplest animations are the most satisfying. When I approach motion graphics, especially where there is text tied to plane of some sort, I try to motivate my 3D camera moves by how a camera would really move.

Step by Step

Out of the three graphics in this section I can tell you the camera motivation for each. The first was motivated by a simple dolly move that doesn’t have any kind of a focus pull, but the camera movement brings the appropriate text into focus accordingly. The second was a motivated jib moved on a pan tilt head with a little bit of a focus push/pull to keep the text in focus. The final graphic, and my favorite, was motivated simply by a tripod head tilt with a focus push to bring the text into focus.

I liked how the graphics played with the voiceover, but I wasn’t sold on the last two. So I chose to find an appropriate check mark and “x” to really drive those points home. As you saw in the graphics, the sound really helped top them out.

When You Sign Up

The next section of graphics is really my favorite and I did myself a favor by actually doing a screen cap time lapse, so I wouldn’t have to explain a lot of the process in text. But you can watch it in this short video.

Now, before you get your nickers in a twist that the breakdown doesn’t match the finished graphic, let me explain. Essentially, this was the original version of the graphics, once the guys from WunderTRE came in to view the ad (about 4 days before the viewing party for the cast, crew, and family) they had some changes they wanted to make just for the motion graphics to be brand appropriate. That meant some small changes. They settled on the font they wanted used for the titles at the top of the graphic. We also decided that the stone grey back ground didn’t really work, because there isn’t anything else in the ad that is primarily darker tones. So I swapped that for a white background as well as recolored a few of the fonts. Lastly, I had to replace the vector art at the end to match their brand line art. Thankfully, those were INCREDIBLY SIMPLE to swap out. The way I build motion graphics, I make them where most elements are simple to swap for situations exactly like this.

8-bit Gaming

Now we’re on to Ross’ favorite graphic, which is my second favorite. It was a HUGE challenge and it took both of us plus the guys at WunderTRE to really get this graphic hammered out. This graphic was born because the original script didn’t really dive into WunderTRE(k) to explain the in’s and out’s in a simple manner. The ad explained the idea, but didn’t tell the audience exactly how it works.

Two days before our viewing party, we had Coby drop by the studio during his lunch break from school (thanks so much for doing that for us). We had the additional script elements ready for Coby to read and he nailed it! So it was a matter of getting this graphic hammered out and finalized so it could be delivered to Ross for sound.

WunderCoby

Matt sent me the WunderCoby vector art and while I was researching how to animate him across the platforms just like our favorite 8-bit video games from our youth, Ross jumped in and actually animated Coby’s body movements. Specifically the running positions and the jump position for the body. I did a LOT of YouTubing and researching on how to animate this to work like an 8-bit video game. In that I learned about sprites and all other means of animation to match that style. Unfortunately, I didn’t have 3 weeks to tackle the animation like these guys and gals were explaining. I really had maybe a morning at most. I tackled the animation by just animating Coby’s forward, up, and down movement. Then I took the background layer of the WunderTRE(k) board and animated it to move behind him, giving the illusion that he was progressing forward on the board. It took a great amount of work, but I got it finished in time for Ross to completely crush (hahaha get it?) the sound on it. I’ll leave the sound design up to him, but let me tell you, it was pretty freaking cool.

Nerdy Work

I don’t want to forget to mention that Ross did some motion graphics work on this project beyond animating WunderCoby. He is responsible for the design and delivery of the Matrix Style Monitor graphics in the “Nerdy Work” scene. That took him the better part of a morning and it was cool how he actually matted the graphic to reveal the WunderTRE logo subtly within the graphic.

Is This The End?

Yes and No! Yes it’s the end of the WunderTRE(k) blog series, but it’s not the end of our work! I hope you’ve found this particular blog post interesting! At least, I hope your takeaway is that we are wildly passionate about the work we do and this project in particular. We appreciate you tagging along all these blog posts (I don’t even know how many it was because I lost count). 

So what’s next for us? Well, it’s hard to say, but you can keep up with the day to day by liking our facebook, following our instagram, and signing up for our Keyframes Newsletter below! We really can’t thank all of you enough for following this wild ride. We do have some exciting things coming. Hopefully you’ve already read a few of the non-fiction book reviews Ross has on the website. There will only be more! 

If you want a project like WunderTRE(k) for your business, give us a shout! We’d love to sit down and talk. We’re here to help put you on the map in a way your competition can’t even dream of! 

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