Coachella Animation

3D & Motion Design

Instructor: David Conklin
School of Visual Arts, 2023

I set out to create a motion design system that used physics simulations to allow type to interact with itself. Creating an animation for a music festival felt perfect for this experiment because the expression of the type felt lively and congruent with the feeling of music.

Physics

Using Physics Simulations for 2D

After blowing up the letter forms in 3D, I used Blenders soft body physics to simulate the type falling and interacting with itself. I created a 16:9 container for the letters to fall into so it would appear the letters are interacting with the edge of the frame.

Transitions

At moments I wanted to reveal to the viewer that the type was actually three dimensional and did so by having the type rotate. This also created an opportunity to wipe the screen or create jump cuts for transitions.

Making 3D Appear 2D

Materials & Matting

A goal of this project was to make the 3D type appear to be a flat vector in the final animation. To achieve this, I created a simple material that removed all shadows from the object. Once the footage was imported into After Effects, it created a perfect matte to fill the type with a flat color in 2D space.

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