Photosynthesis
Kelvin Song created this video for his Biology class.
Kelvin writes:I wanted to see if Blender could be used to create a motion design, so as a weekend project, I put together this animation explaining the photosynthesis process for a Biology class.
Blender still needs a better text tool, and a faster way to do basic letter-by-letter offsetted animations, though making this wasn’t particularly difficult.
very cool. You have done this in just one weekend? WOW ;)
Can you post the .blend file? What components of blender should I learn to do such an animation? Thanks.
a little too fast to read, but really really cool. there’s plenty of stuff I’d like to know how you did it :)
Thanks! The popping-letters text animation was done by converting a text object to mesh, and breaking it up into individual letters. Then I set a scaling keyframe on all of them, went 10-15 frames back, and set each of their scalings to 0(in Individual Origins transform mode) with a keyframe. For added effect, you can add a third keyframe set about ⅔ the way through with the letter scaling at 1.1 for a pop effect. Then I used the graph editor to shift each letter’s animation a frame back, staggering the animations.
The picture animations were done in a similar manner.
The other text animation used simply involved rotating the text 90° and turning it back to flat 0° ten frames later.
I also used this addon a little bit— http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?261705-Animated-Typing-Text-addon
Thank you for your detailed answer!!! I’m going to try to do something like that just for fun :)
It’s pretty good. The main thing I’d watch out for is white text on bright backgrounds, especially if that white text is semi-transparent – I’d suggest a thin black outline around the white text.
Kelvin, it’s COOL ) But really too fast. It’s better to insert some pauses between actions also. And.. I didn’t noticed some explanations about NADP and APS… Maybe I was too excited about music and the speed). My native language isn’t English although I think that not every usual English speaking pupil will remember and understand all this so quickly without repeating.
As an native English speaker I agreed. Too fast.
Yep, I’d agree with that as well. Great job on the project, just needs to slow down a little so it can be read.
This is very nice. How did you animate words to appear and disappear?
Kelvinsong explained it in a comment above. Often a good idea to check previous comments to see if someone else has asked your question already. Here is what kelvinsong’s answer was:
“Thanks! The popping-letters text animation was done by converting a text object to mesh, and breaking it up into individual letters. Then I set a scaling keyframe on all of them, went 10-15 frames back, and set each of their scalings to 0(in Individual Origins transform mode) with a keyframe. For added effect, you can add a third keyframe set about ⅔ the way through with the letter scaling at 1.1 for a pop effect. Then I used the graph editor to shift each letter’s animation a frame back, staggering the animations.
The picture animations were done in a similar manner.
“The other text animation used simply involved rotating the text 90° and turning it back to flat 0° ten frames later.
“I also used this addon a little bit— http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?261705-Animated-Typing-Text-addon “
Ok,Thanks.
GREAT JOB!
I’ll start with the two negatives. Way too fast. Text is too pale in some shots.
You have a lot of information on screen. You need to slow it down for people to read and look at your awesome animation. A narrator would help also. Its just too much info to throw at someone.
The over all look is outstanding! Your models look great. Give us more time to enjoy them.
As a past editor start with the positives. You are more likely to be listened to/read. And secondly the first thing you want to do is encourage. (If there is nothing to encourage then “do no harm”, in this way the recipient knows they are worthy of comment/critique.
Very pretty .
That video is really awesome but also extremely fast. I don’t think it’s well-suited for actually learning something. It’s a bit too strong on the (eye-candy but distracting) effect-side and too weak on the side of letting you remember the text messages. From this video, people might be able to describe what visuals where going on but they likely can’t connect it to the content that’s tried to be taught.
Artistically, it’s really well done but you might want to reconsider the style.
Keep it simpler, so people focus on the things they are meant to focus on, rather than on the beauty of the animation.
The educational power of videos comes from the ability to stop, rewind or repeat them.
Here you inspired the visuals by the content.
Doing it the other way round, inspiring the content by the visuals, would work better.
And I don’t mean you should do a clearer presentation like boring bullet point power point presentations or something. What you did here is much better than those.
In fact, an a bit less clear-cut approach that, however, takes its time so people can actually follow, and has short narrative pauses where they could naturally pause to ponder or rewind to refine, would be much more effective, I think. – based on my experience of watching all kinds of educational or informational videos, noticing, which ones lead me to best understanding.
If your goal with this video wasn’t to have people fully understand the topic but rather to see the general beauty behind it, I think it’s not the best presentation either: The intrinsic beauty of such complex processes like photosynthesis is lost in the extrinsic beauty of the presentation, which isn’t bad for a “wow”-effect but won’t give longer-term interest.
I hope this helped. I focused on the educational side because the artistic quality of it is outstanding and unquestionably well done.
Slow down!
(And yes, do improve the contrast here and there.)
Well conceived, well done.
Great start, but at the end,
I felt there was too much acronym1 converts to acronym2
by sheer leap of faith.
Also, I missed the very important part about antenna pigments
and the role of manganese:
manganese is where the photon magic actually comes together, isn’t it?
But, yes: great initiative;
great to have an up-to-date summary like that. ^_^