The amount of content an average internet user consumes in a day is continuously increasing and shows no sign of slowing down. As social media platforms keep growing bigger, our feeds are flooded with new content all the time, and we constantly scroll through to discover something interesting and eye-catching.

Therefore, brands trying to engage users find it challenging to capture and retain attention with their content, increasingly relying on UI UX designing services. This is where motion design comes into the picture.

It is not just an element of videos and GIFs you see in your feed. When done right, motion design can convert a piece of information into visually captivating and exciting content that grabs and holds viewers’ attention.

As the technology landscape sees continuous innovation and evolution, let us try to gain some insight into the future of motion design.

Table of Contents

1. Mixing 2D and 3D

While 2D movies and cartoons hold their own grace and appeal, the future of motion design focuses on something better. More and more graphic designers are today inclined towards 3D elements when working with projects.

Computer and 3D graphics have the power to create beautiful animations, which are further simplified with the availability of software supporting design and animations in three dimensions.

The future of motion design sees the mixing of 2D and 3D as many designers frequently combine them in the video in an attempt to add a unique style that engages viewers better.

The most common examples of such a combination include the incorporation of 2D overlayers with motion and the incorporation of 2D and 3D animation. Such techniques are not only useful for big-budget ad videos but also increasingly applied in small-scale advertisements posted on digital platforms.

Advancements in animation technologies have made it possible to use software to draw characters directly in a 3D plot. Professionals today leverage the newest tools to animate 2D models and position them on 3D spaces so that they appear to be facing the camera. This type of hybrid animation will be more popular in the future as user preferences for content continue to evolve.

2. VR Animation

VR (virtual reality) has evolved from the fun digital entertainment format thriving within the gaming landscape to a rapidly growing, cutting-edge technology in motion graphics. What started as futuristic gaming in virtual sports has become a powerful technique capable of creating high-quality, professional media in an entirely new way.

Now that brands have realized the importance of storytelling to evoke emotions and form deeper relationships with audiences on social media, designers are focusing on VR-based animation and motion.

Motion design landscape will see more tools designed to help facilitate storytellers to come up with long-form VR narratives that grab attention. These tools will be equipped with features that help sequence narratives, add transitions between shots, synchronize animations with sound, and do more.

One of the best examples of these features is ‘Stops’ native to VR animation that allows the main story to pause while keeping the scene alive. VR storytelling involves many camera angles and paths where this feature helps explore the details the creator has laid out, giving you the freedom to choose when the main story continues.

Such features open up new possibilities for interactive storytelling to help content creators deliver a more immersive media experience.

3. Morphing & Liquid Motion

In this competitive digital world, grabbing user attention in the first few seconds of the content drives marketing success. One of the key techniques that prove to be effective at achieving this is Morphing. It is an effect used in animations and motion pictures that changes a shape, text, or picture into another through a smooth transition. It can even be used to add animations to images and objects as they morph into one another.

Liquid motion involves breaking down shapes into a liquid-like appearance where elements blend in and out seamlessly. Such a combination of timing and liquid elements makes the transitions highly appealing to the viewers. These elements can also be used to create surreal, dreamlike effects and are hence perfect for animated loops and short ads.

The technique of morphing different objects like images, logos, characters, and more in video content is recently becoming increasingly popular. This type of effect acts as a visual magnet that catches instant attention and hooks the viewer till the end.

Such a technique is particularly useful for website animation as it helps retain the user on the page, increasing time spent on the site. It ultimately helps boost the business site’s SEO as Google favors engaging sites that can keep users on them for longer.

4. Vertical Animations

The number of people using mobile devices across the world is increasing every day. This number definitely impacts the way media is perceived today. Vertical animations remain one of the most significant future trends for motion design as more and more advertisers are already tapping on this technique to engage audiences with their brands on social media.

Every social media platform has introduced features like short videos and stories. Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and others have one thing in common – users are engaging with this form of content vertically on their mobile devices. Only a small percentage of people would bother to rotate their phone or tablet to see a video. This has resulted in the rising popularity of vertical videos on these platforms.

What was once seen as an amateurish way for marketers has now been adopted by big, well-known brands, including Netflix, Mercedes, and National Geographic. These giants are using vertical animations through Instagram Stories to engage viewers as they realize that people view videos vertically on popular platforms.

Though platforms like YouTube still use videos made with landscape viewing in mind, most of these videos are seen using a smartphone, so designers will increasingly work with tools and techniques to create vertical media forms. With simple-to-use tools such as InVideo, repurposing videos for different view formats can be effortless.

Final Thoughts

The digitally advancing world is likely to see significant breakthroughs in various industries and areas in the coming years. The positive changes coming about in the media perception and consumption will also impact motion design trends. These insights into the future of motion design give an idea of the evolving nature of the industry.

Artists, designers, and content creators need to stay on top of the latest trends to get the necessary inspiration for innovation in videos and animations that drive the company’s popularity and success.