TYPES OF ANIMATION IN ADVERTISING

October 10, 2023

3D Animation in Advertising Examples

October 29, 2023

HOW IS ANIMATION USE IN ADVERTISING

Animation is a modern art form that is improving rapidly and affecting various industries. In this blog, we discuss animation, computer animation, and advertisement.

What Is Animation?

Philologically, the word animation originated from Anim or Anima. Anim means soul. In psychology, we can come across two keywords called anima and animus, which respectively mean male soul and female soul. Also, the word animal means a creature from the same root. Therefore, an animator is someone who gives life or soul to something.

Animation is a way to bring things to life. It means creating the impression of movement in images or inanimate objects. With this assumption, animation can be considered as a kind of moving painting. However, an animation looks completely natural and the viewer receives a feeling of movement from it.

The progress of this method has resulted in graphic art expanding to the field of cinema and the power of the animator’s imagination to direct a relationship with the dynamic art of film. In this way, dolls or cartoon characters can move and transfer their movement naturally to our sense of sight.

Why Animation?

From an artistic point of view, animation is a method of filming in which motionless objects and images are made to move and feel animated in the eyes of the viewer. Because of the freedom to change the place and also the absence of gravity, the animation film can move and describe the events more than the cinematographic film. That is why many designers, photographers, and filmmakers have turned to it.

What is an Animated Advertisement?

One of the most methodical and systematic types of web ads is animated advertisement. In simple words, an animated advertisement is a short video that promotes a product or service provided by a company. It is known to be one of the most creative and entertaining commercial methods with a high chance of benefiting the trademark. They always result in a high level of attention and benefit for the brand. These types of modern advertisements are usually seen on social media, television, and every media channel.

How is animation used in advertising?

Promoting a business using animated advertisements is becoming more popular every day. These types of commercials can deliver information, help you understand why you need a certain product, and encourage you to learn more about the product or service. They often engage minds through lively storytelling which adds to how attention-grabbing these advertisements can be. It is the kind of ad that will stick to your mind for the rest of the day.

The way animated advertising works is quite simple and fascinating at the same time. All you need to do is hire professionals to create a story, create unique fictional characters, and deliver the message of your commercial through a sequel adventure. Animation can be in the form of a video, gif, display ad, shopping ad, local ad, etc. The mentioned advertisements can be used on different platforms from web pages to a giant screen on your city square.

The benefits of this advertisement method are higher attractiveness, increasing creativity, creating a constructive relationship with the audience, personalization, encouraging the audience to follow your brand, and increasing the power of pre-sales.

What is computer animation?

The art of creating animated and moving images using dynamic computers and software is known as computer animating. This method is one of the subcategories of infographic designing and animation. Computer animation is primarily created using 3D computer graphics, although 2D computer graphics is still commonly used for small-scale work and fast real-time rendering. Sometimes the target of animation is the computer itself, but sometimes it is the target of another medium, such as a film. They are also called CGI (Computer Generated Imagery), especially when used in films. To create the illusion of moving still images, the still images are displayed one after the other. In this way, an image is displayed on a computer, television, or cinema screen and then immediately replaced by a new image that is similar to the previous one but slightly different. This is the same technique used in television and film.

What Are Some Examples of Computer Animation?

Most famous animated movies are created using computer animation methods.

Some of these memorable movies are listed below:

Toy Story 1 (1995)
Toy Story 2 (1999)
Monsters, Inc. (2001)
Shrek (2001)
Ice Age (2002)
Finding Nemo (2003)
Madagascar (2005)
Over The Hedge (2006)
Ratatouille (2007)
Tangled (2010)
Rango (2011)
Brave (2012)
Minions (2015)
Angry Birds (2016)
Boss Baby (2017)
Ferdinand (2017)
Ralph Breaks the Internet (2018)
Adams Family (2019)

Types of Computer Animation

This style is divided into different types of animation. There are Flat 3D animations flat 2D animations, 2D flash animations, virtual 3D animations, 3D virtual reality animations, and mixed animations.

Flat 3D animations

With the improvement of modern computers and displays, software and animators were able to create bright shadows with very high resolution and accuracy.
Combining this capability with software that can draw objects and scenes as a 3D model has effectively created a new generation of animation that requires no structure to create and where all the work is done by the software. Flat 3D animations are very similar to real images thanks to the high precision of light shadows, corners, and image perspective.

Flat 2D animations

These animations are a series of raster images displayed one after the other at a specific speed. The most popular file format is GIF. Because of their large volume, these formats are sometimes used for short-lived, repetitive effects on websites, as there are no limitations on colors and shapes.
Flat 2D animations are commonly used in animated film production. We only watch flat 2D animations on screens. Keyframes and tween frames still play an important role in creating flat 2D animations.

Some famous advertisements made using this method are listed below: (These ads were used as web banners.)

2D flash animations

These animations, which are usually saved as files with the SWF extension, require their software to play. Due to the simplicity in production and the small size of the file, many creators of 2D animations, as well as creators of Internet advertisements, prefer this type of animation.
Flash animations, instead of saving the image, save the vector information and draw it during the playback during the schedule designed by the animator. In flash animations, images and colors are usually flat and lack 3D effects and various colors. This characteristic (which sometimes becomes undetectable with the animator’s care and effort) is sometimes considered as an advantage and sometimes as a limitation for such animations.

Virtual 3D animations

Since the brain can understand the depth of space by combining and superimposing the images received from both eyes, it is possible to simulate a 3D environment in the brain by showing two simultaneous images to each eye. In order to do this, the manufacturer records the desired 3D image from two viewing angles and displays it.

Thanks to a special tool that can view these two images separately for each eye, the viewer sees the image in three dimensions. An example of such images is 3D cinemas. The depth of these images is sometimes so great that the viewer has the impression of being able to touch the objects.

3D virtual reality animations

This type of animation is often used in computer games. By saving a 3D model of space and objects, the computer immediately calculates the required image and draws it when displayed. This technique is also used to train some specialists such as pilots.

What Is the Difference Between Virtual Reality Animations and 3D Virtual Images?

In virtual reality, no movement or reaction is created in advance and the image is created only based on the viewer’s reaction or command and the impression is created that the viewer moves in virtual space.

Mixed animations

In these animations, which are widely used in the film industry, parts of the images are taken from real scenes and only part of the image is added using software. Cinematic special effects are one of the most numerous examples of such animations. Dangers and problems associated with depicting scenes such as fire, explosion, etc. made the use of this animation very attractive for producers.

Computer animation or other methods?

Computer animation is the unquestionable digital replacement of the art of stop motion animation of 3D models and frame-by-frame of 2D images. This style is modern and quite eye-catching.

All in all, the high advancement in technology has provided many new paths for the animation industry. Computer animation is rapidly growing and affecting advertisement as well as entertainment.