Good to know that you choose animation videos for the next project. However, there are many things between before you have a good animation video – like “what are the best types of animation I should go for?”. Over the years, F.Learning has seen many issues – how to visualize knowledge with animation, how to engage customers with animation, how to optimize the budget for animation, etc. Look, the issues seem complicated, but there is only a core one – choose the right type that fits best to your audience. Here’s the guide for that.

5 Best types of animation for your projects

You will see a quick peek into each type and when is the best occasion to use it for your projects.  Then, you can choose the most suitable one to work with animated video production companies.

• Whiteboard animation
• Motion graphics animation
• Hand-drawn animation
• Stop-motion animation
• 3D animation

1. Whiteboard animations

As its name, whiteboard animated video includes hand drawing images/illustrations on a white background. With a nice narrator voice and good images, you can explain various complex concepts, even medical lessons.

What are whiteboard animation’s features?

• Simple illustrations with minimizing colors (from 2-3 colors includes black)
• Simple motion generated by the computer as motion graphic animation.
• Affordable prices (cheaper than producing motion graphics one)

Choose whiteboard animation if:

• You don’t have a huge budget for creating animation
• You don’t emphasize much on the illustrations as long as it could visualize the content
• You want to transform text-based content (ex: eLearning content) and visualize invisible part of your content

2. Motion graphics animations (Character and Non character animation)

Motion graphics animation is the most commonly used, from eLearning to marketing/branding projects. Our clients love it because it helps excite the audience and explain complicated concepts.

How to identify it?

• Colorful graphics, characters, and illustrations that could visualize any type of content
• Simple motion effects that are generated by the computer
• Usually combined with audio (sometimes audio could be the dialogue of characters)
• Storytelling methods that deliver the content by telling a story.

You should use motion graphics animation when:

• You have to explain difficult or abstract concept that need simplification (as Math calculations or scientific processes)
• You want to apply branching scenario technique in your video for better understanding
• The video doesn’t require a pretty smooth movement
• You look for a producing process that is time-saving and cost-effective

Recommend reading:

• 15 superb animation videos for eLearning purposes
• 8 best animation videos for your branding and markeiing purposes

3. Hand-drawn animations

This type of animation is similar to traditional cartoons that you’ve watched on Cartoon Network. In short, hand-drawn is called ‘high-quality and luxury animation’ as animators have to draw every frame of the scene and meticulously do the movement for each frame.

What does a hand-drawn animated video look like?

• Pretty smooth movements created from 15-24 frames for one second
• Usually come with a unique and premium design style
• Costly and time-consuming to produce one minute (can range from $3000 to $50000)

Come to hand-drawn animation if:

• You have a huge budget
• You want to express your personality or brand identity in the animation
• You want to stand out in the market and beat competition.

4. Stop-motion animation

Although it isn’t trending now, stop-motion animation is still showing its power in education, especially in in-class teaching.

The advantages of stop-motion animation:

• Easy to do and quick to create with very basic movements made by hand-changing and camera-capturing.
• Stimulate the creative mind of the video creator in storytelling
• Various animated subjects with flat materials (printed paper/ photographs/ drawing images)

You should opt for stop-motion animation in case:

• You have a tight budget.
• You have in your hand a proper camera and experience in recording
• You are able to use basic video edit software to add some effects to make your video looks better

5. 3D animation (digital 3D video)

More luxury, more premium than hand-drawn animation, it’s 3D animation. In a nutshell, it is a better version of 2D motion graphic animation that visualized the concept in the 3D environment.

3D animation is best for your projects when:

• The subjects need realistic context with high accuracy in visualization (eg: engineering training, medical surgery)
• You want to bring the best learning experience to students
• You invest for a long-term campaign with a specific vision on using animation so high production cost isn’t much a matter (such as brand identity, point of differences)

However, in fact, primary education doesn’t include much-complicated knowledge relating to engineer or surgery. Therefore, it could be a waste to create a 3D animated video for eLearning purposes. That’s why 2D videos usually come as the ideal choice to adopt animation in primary teaching.

Recommend reading:

• 2D vs 3D animation: which works better for your videos

3 criteria to find the best types of animation

1. Define your purpose

Are you making animation videos for eLearning purposes? Do you want to increase sales? How about raising public awareness or capturing the audience’s attention? These questions affect the aesthetic level of animation types.

For example, if you make an animation video for eLearning courses, that means your main purpose is to visualize knowledge engagingly, so motion graphics or 2D animation with simple motion is the best for that, like the below example:

In terms of marketing or branding purposes, you may need hand-drawn animation to capture audience attention and become outstanding among competitors:

Recommend reading:

• How to use animation in eLearning
• How to use animation as an explainer video

2. Define your budget

5 best types of animation come with different price points. Thus, it’s better to research the quotation from different studios, compare their quality to balance your cost. If you have a fixed budget, you can contact F.Learning studio. We will consult you on how to get best animation types within your money.

Recommend reading:

• How to write a clear animated video production RFP for your project

3. Define your timeline

Depends on the complixity of animation types, the production time are different. The time you launch animation videos has a close relation to your learning/ business goals. Thus, be aware to the production timeline of animation types to schedule your plan.

Read Further:

• How to write a good script for animation video
• F.Learning animation production process: How we create an effective animation video
• Create storyboard for animation video