Motion Graphics & VFX

Motion graphics are elements that were never filmed — type, charts, icons, diagrams, UI — animated and placed on screen to explain something. VFX is work done to the filmed image itself: tracking something onto a moving surface, removing an object, replacing a screen, keying out a green background, or building a shot that could not be captured. They overlap constantly, because putting a graphic into live footage so it sticks and belongs is a compositing job. In practice most projects need some of both, and we scope them together rather than as separate line items.

Yes, and it is one of the most common things we are asked for. The ideal handoff is a locked cut plus the project file with linked media; if you cut in a different application, an XML, AAF, or EDL along with the source footage works. We build the graphics against your timeline and hand back both the finished render and the elements as alpha-channel files you can drop into your own project. The one thing that matters is that the cut is locked — graphics timed to a sequence that later shifts have to be re-timed shot by shot.

Yes, and we would rather you send the raw figures than a picture of a chart. Give us a CSV, a JSON export, or a spreadsheet and we build the animation from those values, so the labels and proportions are correct rather than eyeballed. Where the numbers will be updated on a cycle — a quarterly report, a live metric — we link the composition to the data file so a refresh is a re-render rather than a rebuild. We will not put a figure on screen that you cannot substantiate, and we will flag any number in a brief that looks like it came from a rounding guess.

Both. A properly lit green screen gives the cleanest result — even lighting, subject well off the backdrop to avoid spill — and we handle the key, edge treatment, spill suppression, and light wrap so the subject sits in the new background rather than being pasted onto it. Without a green screen, removal is done with rotoscoping and clean plates: masking the subject frame by frame and rebuilding what was behind the removed element. That is slower and it is quoted by shot length and complexity, so send the specific clips and we will price the real work rather than an average.

By default, yes — we build with stock After Effects tools precisely so a handover never leaves your team staring at a missing-effect warning. If a shot genuinely needs a third-party plugin, we tell you before we use it and name it in the delivery, so you can decide whether to license it or have us solve the shot another way. Where a plugin was unavoidable, we also supply a pre-rendered version of that element with alpha, so the project remains usable even without the plugin installed.

It depends almost entirely on shot count and how much plate prep is needed, not on the video's runtime. A kinetic typography pass over an existing edit is quick. A dozen shots needing planar tracking, rotoscoping, and screen replacement is not — roto in particular is per-frame work and it is what makes VFX quotes vary so widely. As a guide: the Scale Package covers a graphics add-on within its 14-day turnaround for the whole kit, standalone projects usually run 7 to 10 days, and single retainer requests average about 48 hours.

That is the default. Send your brand kit — logo files, typefaces, colour values, and any existing motion or animation guidelines — and the graphics are built inside those rules: your typeface at brand weights, your palette applied so text still passes contrast against the footage behind it, and easing that matches how the rest of your motion behaves. If you already have a brand motion system from us or anyone else, we work to it. If you have static guidelines and nothing about motion, we propose the motion rules and write them down so the next person inherits them.