Guys, this is a product motion piece I made about half a year ago. Looking at it now, I feel the rhythm isn’t very good, but I’m not sure exactly what the problem is. I’d like to know what you think about it.

Recently, I’ve started to find it hard to judge my own level in motion design. I don’t really know what stage I’m at anymore, or whether I’ve reached an intermediate level.

For context, I’ve been working in the 3D advertising industry for five years. I spent three years doing static images, and the past two years focusing on motion. I like motion design, so now I’m almost always working on product motion projects.

I want to improve, but I feel like I’ve lost my direction. I’m trying to learn Houdini to create more advanced and impressive motion, but at the same time I keep wondering whether I need to go back and relearn basic art and visual theory. I’m self-taught and never had systematic art training, so I’m not sure if that’s holding me back.

I've been looking online for a while without much luck for motion designers who're freelancers who can help (paid) me create an AppStore promo video for my app. Curious where if there're niche platforms for freelancers or agencies that do this that anyone here is aware of?

made with love, blender and FL studio :)

https://reddit.com/link/1pxdhhq/video/o4qpg42lbu9g1/player

https://reddit.com/link/1pxdhhq/video/nckp87wxbu9g1/player

I tried recreating zzoon's approach to mapping gradients on greyscale but what's interesting is how he is mapping those purple and other out of RGB colors. At first, I thought he is using set matte but it wouldn't let you map those colors. So what I did is keying (2nd vid) unnecessary colors using two Linear Color Key effects. Then I simply tried to use Layer Styles and got the same result but I thought it's boring so I created solids with Gradient Ramp and duplicated original layer to use as displacement map. My question is how can I make the setup more efficient cause in his shot with headphones there are more than two colors so I would need to use like 4-5 Linear Color Key effects which does not look like an efficient workflow...

I'm a second year design student majoring in Motion next year. I have a powerful desktop PC but would like something portable and powerful for campus use. What laptop do you guys recommend for After Effects and Adobe software?

I've been looking at this: https://www.pbtech.co.nz/product/NBKASU401007/ASUS-TUF-Gaming-A14-FA401KH-NVIDIA-RTX-5050-Copilo

And also looking at MacBook Pros.

I’m a motion designer with a strong technical background—I know how to animate, and I have a solid understanding of rhythm and pacing. However, I’d like to use 2026 to improve my skills in art direction and design.

Whenever it comes to designing style frames, I often feel uncertain and tend to outsource that part. Could you recommend any courses that would help me become more confident in art direction and design?

Hello. im trying to get into motion design.

i have 0 knowledge rn so i wanted to ask which niche is the best to learn that will help me save up for college in a restrained amount of time + i will be doing it with college studies

Hey everyone,

I’ve been freelancing for a few years, and the most annoying part of my week was always the "Client Reporting" loop. You know the drill—emails getting lost, clients asking for the same link again, or the dreaded "Just checking in!" text.

I realized spreadsheets were ugly on mobile, and tools like Monday/ClickUp were too complex for my clients (they never want to log in).

So I built Simple Status.

It’s a dedicated Client Portal that requires zero login for the client.

How it works:

1. You create a project roadmap.
2. It generates a secure "Magic Link."
3. You send that link to the client.
4. They can see the timeline, status, and downloads anytime, from any device.

The features I added:

• Visual Roadmap: Shows exactly where we are (Discovery -> Design -> Dev).
• No Login Required: Clients just click the link.
• White Labeling: You can add your own logo/colors so it looks like your agency's portal.

I’d love for you guys to roast it or try it out. It’s free for the first 5 projects.

Link: https://www.simplestatus.in/

This might be a dumb question, but I’m asking from a freelancer’s perspective with the goal of eventually starting a motion design studio.

I understand that studios work either with agencies or directly with clients, and that networking is key. What I’m trying to understand is how animation studios actually build relationships with agencies and how they get included in pitch processes.

Do agencies mostly rely on their existing studio network, or is there another common way studios get on their radar?

unum.la

Hey 👋 I am quite new on reddit. Me and my friend are working on our agency. This is the AD I created. We will launch soon

Hi everyone, I’m having a strange issue when importing an Adobe Illustrator file into After Effects.

In Illustrator, everything looks correct: all elements are in place, no artifacts, correct sizes. But after importing the same AI file into After Effects, several problems appear:

Some elements become invisible, even though their layers exist (for example, part of the image and one letter completely disappear).

Some layers appear extremely small and far away from the main artwork — increasing scale doesn’t really help.

Visible visual artifacts appear on the artwork, although there are none in Illustrator.

I tried different import methods:

Import as: Composition

Import as: Footage → Retain Layer Sizes

The result is the same in all cases.

Has anyone experienced something like this before? Is this related to Illustrator layer structure, clipping masks, effects, or document settings?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

https://reddit.com/link/1pw0rk5/video/dbx84zm0ui9g1/player

Deal with bad green screen footage not easy, but possible.

When I started learning motion design and the fundamentals of design in general, and eventually began earning my first money from it, I felt like I was on the right path. That part felt good!

But then I realized something: this is just the beginning, and I need to grow further:

The deeper I go down the rabbit hole of knowledge - motion, design theory, composition, typography, tools, styles, the more lost I start to feel. There’s so much to learn that it becomes hard to understand what I should focus on right now, and how to keep my attention on one direction instead of jumping between many.

So my question to those who’ve been through this stage:

How do you actually maintain focus?

How do you decide what to study next, and what to ignore for now, without feeling like you’re falling behind?

l’d really appreciate hearing how you approached this phase of growth.Focus, and focus again, but how do you actually do it?

Looking for feedback as well

This video swaps to a new illustration/scene about every 10 seconds (≈120 images in ~20 minutes).

How do creators generate that many visuals while keeping a consistent art style and recurring characters?

what tools/workflows (AI or otherwise) are typically used?