Design and Blend an Animated Logo with HD Video

Always first consider the logo elements, their shapes, different sizes and the context of the company itself. Our animator, Lori Newman, worked with my company’s new logo, designed in Adobe Illustrator, in this way before sketching out several animation ideas, considering how these separate elements would appear, how they would react to one another, and especially how they would resolve into the whole logo.

STEP 1: Design the animation

STEP 2: Create your compositions

Capturing the most interesting motion concepts inherent in the logo, place the logo elements as a simple low-res composition in Adobe After Effects and animate them to get a feel for timing and style. Lori presents these rough animations to us as different compositions. We then review them, keeping in mind the theme, positioning and nature of the company, and discuss any comments we have or minor tweaks we want implemented.

STEP 3: Create your animation versions

For our purposes, we wanted two versions of the logo animation: one for regular use and one slightly different logo that could be used for special situations. Don’t take this idea too far, though. It’s important to police the use of your logo and how many different variations of the animation you have. If there are too many, they can dilute the effectiveness of the design, animation and overall brand equity you’re trying to build.

STEP 4: Create an alpha channel in Illustrator

An alpha channel is basically a separate non-visible layer embedded within a graphics file that stores additional information about that file. Lori likes to use an alpha as a mask, identifying which parts of the logo will be transparent and will therefore allow video to show through. In Adobe Illustrator, she separates the graphic into layers, then combines the red and white TV shapes to create the alpha channel.

STEP 5: Create the animation in After Effects

Import the logo file with the new Alpha information into Adobe After Effects as a 1920 x 1080 composition where you can place all the logo elements. You might want to recreate the text at the bottom of the logo in After Effects. Lori does this to give her more flexibility with the tool set in After Effects.

STEP 6: Add components

Next, create separate compositions with the numbers 00-24, the different frame rates, and the solid color underneath that will alternate. For our logo, Lori animated the red and white TV shape and the company name text.

STEP 7: Finalize your effects

After the basic animation is complete, add an effect. Lori added the Trapcode Shine and DigiEffects Video Malfunction effects to the secondary logo animation. Using the main animation as a base preserves the integrity of the new animation’s look and feel.

STEP 8: Render and output to HD

Render both animations as lossless animation with an alpha channel in the full 1920 x 1080 resolution as single QuickTime files.

STEP 9: Bring the animation into Final Cut Pro

To use the final animations, we simply import the logo animation file into FCP, and put it on the timeline where desired (resizing it on the screen if necessary). If we’re overlaying it on top of video, the transparency in the alpha channel of the logo file will immediately be recognized, automatically allowing the video to pass through as long as the logo animation is on a higher numbered video track than any video you want seen beneath it. All it requires is rendering and it’s ready to go.

Support Gear: Adobe Illustrator, After Effects; Apple Final Cut Pro

YOUR GUIDES

Thomas Strodel
Producer/director/founder
24fps Productions

Lori Newman
Motion graphics artist

Thomas Strodel is an independent producer and director. His NYC-based company, 24fps Productions, specializes in creating original programming for cable, broadcast and satellite distribution.

Lori Newman is a graduate of Rhode Island School of Design with an MFA from the University of California at Berkeley and works as a motion graphics artist based in New York City. Her work involves concept, art direction, design and production, with a particular emphasis in combining color, motion and typography. Samples of her work can be seen on www.lorinewman.com.

Tom and Lori Say Keep In Mind...

In 2005, we retired our old logo in exchange for a newer, more modern one created by graphic designer Francis Ball. As most of you already know, 24fps stands for the rate at which film is shot. Actually, it’s usually 23.98fps, but that wouldn’t have been a very smart logo, let alone company name.

Since we’d been developing more original programming, we decided we needed more than just a static logo at the end of a show. Animating the logo would reflect that extra bit of excitement we put into our productions.

24fps Productions
www.24fpsproductions.com
144 W. 27th St., 12th Fl.
New York, NY 10001
ph. 646.638.0659
tom@24fpsproductions.com