Something a little different for me! I really hadn’t considered doing any kind of animation but I was commissioned to do a Christmas tree graphic for a client. The thought was that it would be used to show the donation levels for their organization. As more donations came in, the tree would fill up with ornaments and candles. Originally, I had intended just to use the 4 levels to chart 0-25%, 25-50%, 50-75%, and 75-100%. That way I could just have four separate images and upload the one that matched the donation level at the time. But the client thought it would be cool to have the tree slowly filling in. Hubby and I were able to convince them that tying it in to the actual donations in real time would be too difficult but that a very simple animation that showed the tree filling up was probably easy enough to pull off. So, that began my very slow and clumsy foray into animation using Adobe Animate (previously called Flash). Truth be told, I tried using a different program first called AfterEffects but it was just way more complicated than what I needed it for. In the end, I think I came up with something nice. It IS a bit clunky. I would like a smoother transition, but I’m happy that something happened. And now, I have some knowledge of the program and can maybe explore it more on my own time.
As this is a commissioned piece, I like to link to the organization that paid for the project. This piece was commissioned by a local non-profit group called Mission For Area People. This was part of their Advent event. If you’re interested in checking out their organization and maybe even donating to their event, please check them out at http://missionforareapeople.org
