Traditional Animation

Mortal Arena 2: Animated Teaser

This time, we had a chance to work on an exciting street-fighting style animated project. Due to some reasons, we can’t tell you what product we are introducing so you have to guess! Have fun watching!

There was no limitation in creativity, and our client was open to any ideas. We had fun playing with the story.

Can you guess which character is our hero?

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It was fun to name our fighters.

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The ending was made entirely in 3D software.

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Let’s see how we did the animation. It always comes with an animatic.

YOKO: Anime TVC

YOKO is a nutrition brand from Japan. The product helps children absorb nutrients easily & maintain healthy digestive systems. In Vietnam, the product is distributed by Vinamilk, one of the largest dairy company here. Red Cat Motion produced their first animated TVC in anime style. There were many challenges during the journey, but the client and our team are happy with the final result.

Brand: YOKO
Agency: Circus Digital
Visual and animation: Red Cat Motion

As this was the first time YOKO joined an Animation project, they had so much confusion. Therefore, Red Cat Motion tried to come up with many demonstrations of different anime styles for a character from the TVC. This helped the client make up their mind easily and decided to go with Red Cat Motion without hesitation.

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There were many characters in the TVC. Each of them was sketched carefully before we proceeded to illustration. Red Cat Motion had made more than 100 sketches with many rounds of revisions…

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…. in order to build up such adorable characters.

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Although he is a nutrition expert, we wanted to make him look friendly to the kids. His sense of humor and magic tricks were developed to catch the audiences’ attention and curiosity. “Kids, guess what’s in my hands?”… “Ah ha, there’s nothing, haha”.

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The milk can was also suggested to be re-drawn in anime style. However, we decided to use the “real” package image to be “safe”.

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The background is a lab with a beautiful view of Fuji Mountain and a sakura tree. Although it’s just a lab, our artists at Red Cat Motion produced many options for it as well. The final outcome looks dreamy, doesn’t it?

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And this is our final outcome.

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Triip.me: Explainer Animation

When was the last time you traveled? We hope you can pack your bags for your next trip soon. If you do, remember to visit Triip.me and find out how you can get benefits from this co-op traveling platform. We help Triip.me to reveal their missions in form of animation.

Triip is the world's first decentralized travel co-op that uses blockchain technology to help travelers and businesses become co-owners. Through the platform, Triip can lower operating costs and increase the margins for tour operators, accommodation owners, and lifestyle business owners. Travelers earn rewards and enjoy a better price when they voluntarily share their travel plans with the network.

Client: Triip
Agency: Red Cat Motion
Visual and animation: Red Cat Motion

THE STORY

This story was delivered from a traveler’s perspective. He has been staying home for such a long time due to the pandemic. He wants to travel again so badly but his travel experience was such a nightmare. No more tourist trap with Triip.

ART DIRECTION

We divided the video into 2 parts. In the first part, the look and feel is dark. When the guy steps into the Triip’s lab, the second part begins. You can feel the happiness inside this wonderland.

These 2 perfect images can explain everything about our story direction.

ANIMATION

The video combines many animation techniques which include Motion Graphics, 2D animation, 3D animation, and Traditional Animation. It took us 1,5 months just for the animation, but look at the result, it's worth the effort.

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Vinamilk Hero: Cartoon Series

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Vinamilk is one of largest dairy companies in Vietnam. We work with the client to produce a series of animated MV for their brand called Hero. There are 2 episodes in the series so far. More to come!

Episode 1: Vinamilk Hero vs Boss of Game

Episode 2: Vinamilk Hero vs Boss of Pollution

Want to know how we did it?

Hit the play button to see our progress.

Every single shot is taken care of with love by our illustrators, animators and compositors.

Vinamilk illustration, Video Marketing Agency, Red Cat Motion

Background Illustrations add more depth to our animation.

Snellings Law: Explainer Animation

Persistence that pays - Snellings Law

We’ve got a chance to work with Robert at Snellings Law to make a few cartoons for them, explaining why Snellings Law is a trustful service when you need to handle unpaid accounts. The 1930 cartoon style with a mix of modern tastes makes this project very fun to watch.

Some designs from the project.

Pepsi: Animated TVC

We are proud to work with Pepsi Vietnam on their new TVC spot to celebrate TET 2020. Our scope includes 1 TVC Spot and 2 KVs.

Client: Pepsi Vietnam
Agency: BBDO
Production House: Red Cat Motion, Freaky Motion
Director: Leo DINH

Team BBDO
Account: Nhi Doan, Yen Pham, Huong Nguyen
Art Director: Ngoc Tiny, Khanh Dinh
Copywriter: Sang Huynh

Team Red Cat Motion
Account: Phuong Uyen
Lead 2D Character Animator: Mai Nguyen
Clean Up Artist: Tru Nguyen Hoang, Tuyen Nguyen, Vo Hoan (Hương), Loan, Như, Nhat Lynn Nguyen
Concept Artist: Nguyễn Thành Long

Team Freaky Motion
3D producer: Nguyễn Chí Trung
3D motion design: Nguyễn Hữu Đạt
3D graphic design: Nguyễn Hồng Nhung
Compositing: Leo DINH

Music/Sound Design: Luke Brown, Liam

It is an exciting moment to see our works display everywhere.

Character Design

Pepsi has the design already. However, they are used for the packaging only, so we have to redevelop them for the animation. A model sheet was built. It was a real challenge for us to bring the character to life.

Pepsi Vietnam, Video Marketing Agency, Red Cat Motion
Some design options for its nose.

Some design options for its nose.

Pepsi was very happy with the 2D character, and they came up with another brief which transformed the character into 3D. Unfortunately, this character will be used for another project.

Styleframes

Based on the initial brief, we designed the styleframes with solid blue Pepsi colour background. However, the client didn’t feel the mood of TET there, so we changed our approach.

A real background was added to the scenes. We didn’t shoot the background but used stock images and manipulated it with items to create the TET mood.

Pepsi Vietnam, Video Marketing Agency, Red Cat Motion
Pepsi Vietnam, Video Marketing Agency, Red Cat Motion

This is the final styleframes.

Animation

The project was in a rush, and the TVC spot need to stay 15 seconds only. Also, the 3D team and 2D team didn’t work at the same place so we needed to plan the animation carefully.

7up Fido Dido: Animated TVC

7up is now introducing their brand new packaging with a fresher look for this new year.

Client: 7up
Agency: Redder Advertising
Production House: Red Cat Motion

Some still frames of the new packaging in 3D

“Fresh and natural” endframe

“Fresh and natural” endframe

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Biti's Kid's: Animated Short Film

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If you haven’t known yet, in Vietnam we celebrate Tet as our new year day which is the first day of the first month in the Lunar Calendar. It is considered the biggest and most popular festival of the year in Vietnam.

Local people take the longest holiday on Tet, and there are so many traditional activities to do like saying goodbye to Kitchen God, wrapping Chung cake with families, visiting relatives, friends and neighbors. Kids will receive lucky money on Tet.

Nowadays, the young generation doesn’t know much about these traditions and their origins, so Biti’s Kid wants to do a meaningful activity. They create a board game for families to play on Tet with their kids and tell them about beautiful stories of Tet.

Red Cat Motion creates a short film to introduce Biti’s Board Game. The main theme is “racing Tet”. 4 main characters representing 4 traditions of Tet will race together and collect their items along the journey. Who gets the first 3 items and returns to their destination will become the winner.

It was such a long journey to see our imagination comes true.

There was no hesitation when our director decided to combine 2D character animation style on a 3D pop-up background. This was the first time we experimented with a new art style, but the client trusted us and wanted us to do our best.

The Board Game

The board game is a race between 4 characters who are Lang Lieu, Mai An Tiem, Kitchen God, and Lucky Money Girl. Each character stands for a Vietnamese-specific tradition. Lang Lieu was the one who found Chung cake and became the 7th Hung King. Mai An Tiem was abandoned on an isolated island by his king. Living on the island, he found a seed that grew to watermelon. He carved his name on every watermelon and drop them on the water. On the land, people found his watermelon and told the king. The king invited him back to the land. Mai An Tiem was considered to be the ancestor of growing watermelons in Viet Nam.

To win the game, each character needs to collect 3 items. For example, Mai An Time has to collect a watermelon, a boat, his tools and return to his destination before other competitors to win the game.

To play the game, each player chooses a character and drops the dice and moves their character respectively to the number shown on the dice.

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Our Scope

Make a short film to promote the board game. The film needs to feature all the characters racing together and collect items to win the game.

A Map

Based on the board game, 4 characters will run and only one participant will win the race. We need to bring that theme to the film. To do that, we designed a map that is detailed enough to know which items need to be designed.

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Characters

The characters must be fun and cute to attract our target audiences. All characters wear local traditional customs.

From left to right: Lang Lieu, Mai An Tiem, God Kitchen, Lucky Money Girl.

From left to right: Lang Lieu, Mai An Tiem, God Kitchen, Lucky Money Girl.

But appears to help Lang Lieu at the end of the story.

But appears to help Lang Lieu at the end of the story.

In-Game Elements

Because our director wanted to have a fly cam view to see the magical world, we need to design enough elements to bring it alive. It is such a massive amount of works within 4 weeks.

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3D Design

The 3D team did such a great job of bringing all the sketches to life.

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Layout

Only 3 days before the deadline, we sorted this out as we wanted to make every single scene as good as possible.

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Storyboard

The storyboard is a must in every animation project.

Animation

For character animation, we chose the traditional method to make them fluid and smooth. Each character comes with a model sheet to guide the animator.

Each action was drawn roughly to get the right rhythm. When the key action is locked, the animator will draw in-between frames to create smoothness. If the director is happy, all the frames will be cleaned up before painting. Traditional animation requires an enormous effort but it is fun to watch the final outcome. See this video to understand our process.

Title Design

To help viewers remember the name of each character, our client requested to have a title for each of them.

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2D Background for Opening

The client wanted to show the family playing the game before the camera flies into the box and show the in-game world. We need to separate the 2 worlds so we decided to paint the background.

Credit

Client: Biti's KIDS
Brand Manager: Lê Tăng Gia Phú

Agency: Redder Advertising
Video Agency: Red Cat Motion
3D Production House: Freaky Motion

Director: Leo DINH
Producer: Cao Châu
Account: Trần Hồng Phúc

Storyboard Artist: Nguyễn Hoàng Vĩnh Khang
Art Directors: Kim Phụng, Ty Heo (Ngọc Trâm)
Designer: Bi Võ
Illustrator: Nhật Lynn
Concept Artists: Kim Phụng, Ty Heo, Trung Tín, Nhật Lynn, Quỳnh Như, Thành Long, Tuyền Nguyễn

Motion Leader: Minh Phạm
Animators: Nguyễn Tất Viễn, Sơn Vũ

Hand-Drawn Animation Leader: Mai Nguyen 
Key Animators: Mai Nguyen, Khoa Bùi, Nguyễn Hoàng Vĩnh Khang, Lâm Tân Khoa 
In-between & Clean up Artists: Khoa Bùi, Nguyễn Thanh Phương, Tuyền Nguyễn
Colour Artists: Lâm Tân Khoa, Nguyễn Thanh Phương, Tuyền Nguyễn, Nguyễn Hoàng Trụ, Ngọc Mỹ, Nhật Lynn, Quỳnh Như

3D/VFX Supervisor: Nguyễn Hoàng Anh
Technical Director: Đỗ Lê Duy
3D Motion Leader: Nguyễn Hữu Đạt
3D Motion Designer: Dương Thế Anh
3D Model/ Graphic Leader: Nguyễn Hồng Nhung
3D Texture/ Concept Artist: Nguyễn Thị Bích Lan
3D Generalists: Nguyễn Hà Phương, Nguyễn Chí Trung

Sound Designer: Luke Brown, Liam Iliffe
Voice Talent: bé Minh Tiến

#TetCoTich #CuocDuaCoTich #VoiBitisBeThemYeuVanHoaDanGian