Introduction

Time—the fourth dimension—has been realized as a vital force in visual communication. Its powerful impact as a vehicle for communication and artistic expression has enhanced the landscape of thinking among graphic designers.

Since the late 1970s, graphic design has evolved from a static publishing discipline to a practice that incorporates a broad range of communications technologies including film, animation, interactive media, and environmental design. The field of motion graphics has captured the imagination of designers and viewers in the twenty-first century. Motion is becoming a principal part of our contemporary visual landscape with integrative technologies merging television, the Internet and immersive environments. The extraordinary evolution of motion graphics in our complex ‘information age’ mandates the need for effective communication and the demand for motion graphic designers who can design for film, television, the Web, and interactive forms of entertainment.

Designing in time and space presents a set of unique, creative challenges that combine the language of traditional graphic design with the dynamic visual language of cinema into a hybridized system of communication. The objectives of this text are to provide a foundation for understanding the essence of motion graphic design, to examine pictorial and sequential principles that are unique to choreographing image and motion, and to explore how the merging of composition and choreography can communicate visual messages with meaning, expression, and clarity. Additionally, it strives to address how designers have shaped the landscape of visual communication and how stylistic trends can be used in the design process.

Having said that, this book should not be mistaken as a software-specific guide, but should be viewed as a historical and critical overview of how motion graphics has evolved as a commercial practice in the motion picture, broadcast and interactive media industries.

Throughout each chapter, case studies and engaging graphics that feature works of high artistic merit from practitioners and students from across the globe offer insight into how designers formulate ideas, solve problems, and search for artistic expression. Sample assignments are intended to challenge and motivate you to develop an understanding of motion literacy, kinetic images and typography, and the pictorial and sequential aspects of composition.

The human imagination has no limits. The artistic impulse to experiment and innovate burns inside all of us. This text is written with the hope of inspiring you artistically. I encourage to examine this comprehensive text and push ahead to the boundless frontier of motion graphics as an independent and commercial enterprise.