This animation begins with the exterior of the new Edinburgh International Conference Centre atrium extension, currently under construction. After moving through the ground level, the camera travels to the subterranean levels and that’s where the unusual features are. Because not only is the main hall built directly under the building next door – the also under construction 7-floor EICC office block – it also has a technologically innovative engineered floor which allows the space to be used for many different types of events.
I followed the architects’ plans showing how the floor was subdivided so that with the touch of a button the space could be transformed from a flat floor banquet to raked banquet to full arena, with many other variations. Despite the challenges, I think it was a lot easier for me to build in 3d than it would be in reality.
The new office block extension to the Edinburgh International Conference Centre is a seven-story building but also has three sub-zero levels. These connect through to the new atrium extension next door and ultimately to the EICC itself. It took me some time to get to grips with the architects’ drawings but once I had an understanding of the floorplans and all the associated information I started building the 3d model from the inside out.
This sequence dispensed with the usual 3d flythrough procedure of a single camera perspective, instead opting for a multi-camera edit. It’s difficult to create internal and external lighting in the same scene but that’s what was called for, as well as 3d figures to populate the scene. We rendered the animations in HD, which certainly kept them crisp, and the result was projected onto a huge screen in the EICC.
It will be very strange for me once the building is complete and I visit for the first time.
Aegon, one of the world’s largest pension providers, were looking for a novel way of presenting additional brand information within a web video. Originally they felt it would require multiple videos, each focussing on a particular strand of their business. I was asked to come up with a way of introducing interactive elements in order to keep the movie short and snappy.
I built this flash interface which allows the viewer to pause the video and see more information simply by hovering over the screen. When you move the mouse off the screen the information disappears and the video continues. Sounds quite simple now that I see it written down.
This is an architectural rendering of the new extensions to the Edinburgh International Conference Centre, currently under construction in Scotland’s capital and due to be unveiled in 2013.
Building the 3d models in itself was quite a challenge. The glass atrium building connects directly to the existing round-turreted EICC, but the seven-story office block to the right of it also connects to both buildings through a complex series of underground corridors and halls. (I’ll upload the interiors in a seperate posting.)
These exterior scenes try to illustrate the level of detail that the architectural plans demanded. Even once the modelling was completed, there was still the lighting and texturing to work on in order to try and replicate what the architects had in mind. Not to mention rendering. (The completed piece is 5 minutes long.) Every time I thought I’d cracked it, it turned out there was another corner or nook that I hadn’t noticed. Like the roof garden for example. Oh yeah, then there was a little thing called Edinburgh Castle in the background..
This animation piece was commissioned by Sky Television for a management conference and was screened at the massive O2 Cineworld in London. The video above shows the rushes I created for them and the video below shows how these were used in the overall presentation by Edinburgh’s LA Media.
The idea was to illustrate the communication process between customers, engineers and sales staff and the fibre optic line effect connected the various satellite points in the galaxy.
It wasn’t the simplest of tasks, most notably because of the very short timeframe involved. It’s not every day you get asked ‘can you build us an inter-connecting galaxy by next week?’
I’ve created a lot of 3d maps over the years and it’s always difficult thinking up fresh ways of presenting them. This one for Connoisseurs Scotland uses a similar technique to the one I built for Cairn Energy earlier this year, complete with fluffy clouds.
The idea was to present a selection of venues represented by Connoisseurs Scotland as the finest luxury spots Scotland has to offer, and locate them generally on the map.
This was used as part of an overall presentation for the group to promote Scottish hospitality. Which actually does exist.
There are many factors that will influence a website’s search engine placement. But what the major search engines will never do is produce a definitive list of do’s and don’t’s, for the very good reason that poor websites with low-value content could be manipulated by unscrupulous webhosts to achieve higher rankings. Which is exactly what used to happen in the old days.
But a reputable search engine marketing consultant should never have to resort to dirty tricks in order to achieve better results.
With several years’ experience as an SEO consultant, guiding websites up through Google and Yahoo’s search listings, I know all the issues involved in optimisation. I also know all the myths and the ‘things that used to work but don’t any more.’ I have well-documented evidence of the campaigns I’ve run and can see how they’ve been affected by my marketing decisions.
This website has a page one ranking in Google for the following search terms:
Graphic designer Scotland
3d Animation Edinburgh
3d Event Planning
3d Accident Reconstruction
Television Graphics Scotland
Flash Animation Edinburgh
..along with other keywords specific to my industry.
I can improve your website’s visibility through guided SEO Marketing. The best way to begin is with a review of your website, which I do free of charge. So call me now on 01506 650321 or email info [at] funhousegraphics dotcom, and take the first step up the rankings.
If you’re reading this two years from now, you might be wondering what the fuss is about. Html5 is standard isn’t it? Well at the time of writing, Html5 is far from standard. It’s brand new and still has lots of issues. And one of the biggest is – how does Html5 handle video?
An explanation for non-techies. To date, video on the web has been dominated by Flash. But with Apple’s announcement that Flash would not be supported on the Ipad, it became clear they are trying to force the issue on the idea of an alternative.
For people like me who produce a lot of web video, there’s no simple answer as to how to encode clips that will satisfy both the older browsers like Internet Explorer and newer ones like Chrome. At this point, both support Flash but only the newer ones can handle Html5. So you could carry on using Flash for a while, but once they start actively dropping support for it, as in the case of the Ipad, you need to start looking at alternatives.
So the unusual thing about the video above is not its content, but the fact that it will play in any browser you choose, including the Ipad. The way that you see it is dependent on the browser you’re using. If I’m wrong and it doesn’t work for you, please let me know. And let’s see where we are in two years time.
To see how the video plays on your mobile, scan the image below to view this post in your smartphone:
This is a 3d reconstruction based on a court report into a road traffic accident. The details of the accident itself have been omitted.
The scene clearly demonstrates the power of 3d animation in conveying a large amount of information in a short space of time. Court reports are generally commissioned by solicitors or insurance companies and can be forty pages long or more. They are based on many documents including witness statements, physical evidence, terrain maps as well as weather conditions, lighting conditions, road surface and visibility information. Calculations and analysis are made based on the laws of physics and applied mathematics. It is the job of the 3d animator to portray this analysis as accurately as possible.
The ability to place multiple cameras in the scene is a huge advantage of 3d accident reconstruction. Once the mechanics of the scene have been built, driver’s eye views, witness views, overhead views, moving cameras can all help to illuminate the situation.
I'm Greg Moodie, a freelance graphic designer based just outside Edinburgh in Scotland. I've been trading as Funhouse Graphics since 1998 and specialise in 2d & 3d animation with a heavy dash of quirky.
