Stormy Studio were thrilled to be able to work for Australian marketing agency Thinkerbell to create this bespoke (and fun) 3D flying pig animation for Spirit, a popular Australian Internet firm.
Working within the confines of the budget, we were tasked with modelling and animating an endearing flying 'business pig'.
The reasoning for the 3d flying pig animation was part of larger marketing campaign, which was making light of the reputation of poor internet speeds expected in Australia. Spirits internet offering (rated Australias fastest internet provider) is running with the slogan 'Now pigs really do fly' inline with the fact that you really can have fast business internet speeds.
The pig animation will be used for various billboards, printed media, HTML 5 animated adverts and online video ads.
'Realistic' looking 3D flying pig animation
One key aspect of the project brief, was to deliver a realistic finish to our animated pig. This meant we had to strike a balance between realism and style. Through a short R&D process we arrived at the perfect textures, lighting and 3D hair that would achieve the needed results, whilst still allowing for relatively quick render times.
Our pig went through many rounds of character design and review as we tweaked different aspects of characters head, and body poses. As with all things, the eyes proved key to building a likeable personality.
Early iterations had some slightly initimidating looks, we also tried versions with longer and much shorter snouts.
There were also different approaches for the pigs wings, both in terms of style and also the position on the pigs back.
As we approached the final modelled version of the 3D flying pig animation, we were able to concentrate on the finer details, with much faster iterations.
Various different pink shades to the skin were tried to see what really made him 'pop'. We had white, pink and even yellow tinted wings, always edging toward the perfect final look.
Our perfect hero flying pig... ready for animating
Decisions were made on the length, tone and visibility of the 3d hair.
Our lead 3D animator Ian, developed a technique that allowed for the hair to be rendered out on seperate passes so we could quickly tweak its shade and get sign off from our clients at the Australian marketing agency.
The final result was actually very subtle, though at one point there were much 'fluffier' options that reacted to wind.
The Stormy Studio creative director worked mocked up the timing using a couple of 2D stills of the pig, to ensure the movement would fit into the 7 to 8 seconds. Perfecting the timing for the flight in, bounces, wink and exit.
The lead animator then brought the 3d animate flying pig perfectly to life, with a few rounds of feedback and refinement.
The 3D flying pig animation for Spirit was a fantastic project to work on. Allowing us to raise the bar for our studios own 3D character work and deliver a result our clients were thrilled with.
If you'd like to discuss an animated character video of your own, or another business animation, please get in touch with our team today.
Dancing Bacon Animation
A day after completing the pig project, we had the opportunity to pitch for a dancing bacon animation.
We could'nt resist the irony. Here's the video we very quickly pulled together as part of that pitch.
It mixed, motion captured data to quickly bring our curvy rectangle (Bacon in the making) to life.