Google Trusted Media Summit 2022 Animation
Agile work for the Google Trusted Media Summit
A look into how I managed to put together an entire animation with just 2 days between receiving the script and the deadline, going through how having a flexible agile workflow and responsiveness can help save otherwise impossible projects (for a single person).
THE MISSION
I was approached by Google News Initiative to contribute an animated interview trailer for their 2022 trust media summit, all about misinformation and how to deal with it. I took care of the entire process from direction to execution, Google the key visual that we see at the beginning and end, while I created the rest of the assets, some assets were sourced from libraries while others were custom-made.
THE OUTCOME
The biggest challenge regarding this project was the fact that the script was only finalized 2 days before the deadline, meaning that there had to be a lot of guessing work and backtracking in an agile workflow in order to get as many assets as possible ready for animation, then animating everything in a couple of days, all on my own.
Fortunately, The producer from Google was really responsive and quick to provide feedback, which helped speed up the review process.
SERVICES OFFERED
Creative Direction
Art direction
Design
Animation
Editing/Post-Production
THE IMPACT
In order to work around the tight deadline, we decided to keep animation and design work extremely simple, with just simple movement and easy transitions, while focusing on the messaging and the displaying of the people being interviewed. In the end, the project was a success and we were able to get the video ready for sharing at their conference.
A Challenging project for a challenging issue
For this project, it was really important to tell the right message, and this required careful refining of the script by the team at Google News, as well as editing of the experts being interviewed to tell a concise and easy-to-digest story with an important message: working together for the truth.
It all starts with some Creative Direction to plan ahead.
STORYBOARDS
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Initial moodboard
Helped i part by the design team at google, i put together a collection of reference to help set in stone the style we would be aiming for the rest of the video, this was put into question multiple times but in the end thy came back to the initial direction as final
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Initial Rough Storyboard
In the end, the whole concept was rejected, but it help move the conversation in the right direction
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Custom illustrations I made
In the end we didn’t use all of them, but this gave a custom feel to the whole video, and a personal touch of humanity in a sea of minimal design.
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Early Styleframing round
An initial style frames board was put together at the time, this had to be scrapped as the entire script was changed, but it helped lead the producer along the right path.
Agility is the name of the game
Since the script was not being finalized up to 2 days before the deadline (the conference event) Partial work had to be done along the way in order to prepare as many assets as possible for animation, premade icon packs and simple procedural animation techniques had to be used to make it possible.
5 minutes of animation, 5 revision sessions, 1 animator & illustrator.
Thanks to the simplicity of the project and the dynamic rigs that I implemented, applying changes was fast, allowing us to tweak all of the small kinks in a matter of seconds, allowing us to apply changes 5 to 6 times in just half a day.
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We added some animated simple icons to help bring more variety and clarity to the concepts being explained.
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They wanted to keep things simple and monochromatic, but still, have some elements of the Google branding in terms of the font and subtle color accent.
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The most important part was to get every participant looking appealing in the illustrations, as well as make the spoken sections feel dynamic, which we achieved through procedural movements and audio-reactive effects.
Finishing Touches
With the animation approved, and technical matters tweaked, Google provided some additional animated assets in the form of some characters sliding up towards the north start, riding the golden path, I took over the project files and implemented them into my own take to enhance the visuals.
Any questions? Feel free to reach out!
Zetanimo@pm.me
Whatsapp: +584148109974