Connecting cultures for Sahara Net professional animation explainer
Who said that an animation explainer has to be strict, conservative, super-minimalistic, and filmed on-sight at the office? Working with clients from all over the world we encounter one common issue which bothers our customers. How to keep the balance between showing integrity, and underlining their own culture and traditions of the country of origin? How at the same time show understanding and openness to global business trends? Cultural discrepancies between the partnering companies may lead to a loss of collaboration.
A business explainer for the global leader of Internet and Communication Technology Sahara Net
Sahara Net is a top Internet and Communications Technology provider in the Saudi Market. The challenge was to create a highly professional business explainer video. The motion video had to depict the scope of the company’s services. The message had to target both audiences on the regional market, as well as in the international arena. Xplai’s team had to approach the problem through a culturally sensitive filter. Therefore, we decided to emphasize the transitions that will be the neutral key element throughout the animation explainer video.
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Nonetheless, we didn’t want to stick too close to the classics. Static and boring in the range of black tie business classics, or on the contrary, overloading it with unknown terminology. However, we didn’t want to go too far with the animation to avoid making the explainer too cartoonish either. Finally, we’ve found the compromise. Our team decided not to push too far on the illustrations and animation and chose a softer approach in order to represent a wide range of cloud services offered by the company.
Acknowledging and accepting cultural uniquenesses in a professional video explainer
It was our first time working on a project for Saudi Arabia, therefore it was important to understand the mindset of the target audience before we jump into anything. Some things that not everybody understands is that prior research about the specific aspects of the country is as important as the process itself, in particular, due to the cultural differences. We thought through and analyzed all incorporated elements.
Uniting through colors in animation business explainer
Each color scheme to sound effects for the transitions between the scenes. It was important to find the right balance in order for the video to look good, engage the viewer and fully fulfill its’ purpose. We didn’t want to fall victim to stereotyping and yet the idea was to illustrate the setting of the country of origin.
The illustrator took a conservative approach in terms of illustration shapes and forms. However, he decided to choose a non-trivial color scheme. Think about the Sahara desert. What is the first association that comes to mind? For us – it is sand or desert, depicted through camel orange color and dark velvet purple, representing wealth and fortune in the region. The artist has been playing with the colors to achieve instrumental attribution through symbolic and emotional representation.
Illustration and animation
Minimalistic illustration helped to balance off the mild animation we wanted to keep the dynamics by adding diversified transitions between the scenes, yet smoothing the effects. That way you can notice cascade animation with the growing shelves or rope animation effects that help to connect several layers without breaking the general impression of continuity in the overall picture. Adding a momentum effect is always eye candy as it makes the video smoother and not as jumping in your face while sharing information.
Transitions are the number one factor of a fulfilling professional business explainer
According to our opinion, good transitions are half of the success of a great explainer for businesses. It delivers a seamless experience and clarity of understanding and serves. Transitions function as connectors between different ideas. They take off an emotional and intellectual load in case the animation for business is overloaded with information. Because our mind gets bored very fast, it uses psychological anchors to keep the viewer engaged and focused on the subject.
The plane transition was a great conceptual move that we used as a solution to jumping in between the bullet points on the presentation to change the topic. It helped to avoid heavy and awkward pauses while preparing the viewer for the new scene.
In addition, a good sound effect increases the chances of higher engagement and sets the mood of the animation video. After all, it is not only our job to create comprehensive explainers that correspond with to concept of the business, but also something we simply love doing. And I think it shows.
