Animated videos play a crucial role in the training and further education of employees, customers and partners. They make abstract concepts and complicated processes tangible and entertaining by transforming the information into visually easy-to-understand scenes. Such visualisations help learners to remember and absorb the content better.
With Vyond, anyone can easily create engaging and professional videos. This blog post will show you the best methods to successfully create your first Vyond video.
Why do videos work?
People have different preferences when it comes to media. Some prefer reading, others like listening to podcasts or watching videos. Explanatory videos are particularly suitable for communicating complex topics using animations, graphics and audio. They increase user engagement and can be used flexibly – to demonstrate new software applications, develop leadership skills or explain policies and procedures. Animated video is also a great way to support onboarding processes and compliance training.
That’s why it’s crucial that your videos are optimised with proven methods and tools, such as Vyond. Here are five best practices to help you maximise the quality and impact of your Vyond videos.
1. New action, new scene
Start each new action or character in your video with a new scene. This not only ensures a clean and tidy timeline, but also makes it easier to present your story in a clear and structured way. Think about how many scenes are necessary to convey your information effectively without overloading the learner.
To create a new scene in Vyond, first start Vyond Studio and navigate to your current video project file. Click on the ‘+’ sign in the timeline at the bottom of the screen to add a new scene.
Depending on the use case, you can decide here whether you want to continue your current scene or start with a completely new template. If you continue your current scene, the background and the existing objects from the last scene are transferred to the new one to create a seamless transition. When selecting a new scene, however, a white background is set by default.
Learners prefer to get their knowledge from sources that are interactive and visual. People retain only 10% of what they read, but up to 90% of what they absorb through visual and interactive learning. For text-heavy learning materials, Vyond Go offers a simple solution: you can quickly turn your text into a video with Vyond Go. This encourages engagement and also makes it easier to understand and remember the content.
Want to dive deeper into Vyond Go? Take part in our enabling and inspire with animated videos too!
2. Characters: design, customisation & tools
Vyond allows you to personalise your characters with the Character Creator. Use this feature to create characters that represent your target group or take on specific roles in your narrative. Personalising your characters for the target group strengthens the emotional connection and promotes identification with the content.
In Vyond Studio you will find the Character Creator, which allows you to intuitively create your own characters. First select ‘Character’ from the menu. Here you can adjust the gender, clothing, hair colour and other attributes to suit your needs.
Tip: Colour-coordinate small details on your characters to create a harmonious and consistent colour scheme in the video.
Characters can of course also be adapted to reflect your company’s corporate identity/corporate design (CI/CD), for example by matching the colour of the clothing to the company colours. This results in a harmonious look that matches the corporate image and supports the professional presentation.
You can also upload your own characters if they already exist as company specifications.
3. Synchronise animation and audio track
It is important that your animations and audio are well coordinated to tell a coherent story. Make sure that the movements of the objects harmonise with your audio clips and sound effects. This creates an immersive experience that improves learners’ understanding and emotional response. This enhances the impact of your video and increases its professionalism.
To effectively synchronise your animations and audio, start by adding your voice recordings or sound effects to your project (or select directly from the Vyond asset library). Then drag your assets into the timeline where your objects are placed.
Play the video in between to check that the movement of the assets and the sound are synchronised. If this is not the case, you can easily adjust the timing settings in the timeline until everything fits together harmoniously.
4. Avoid visual overload
Although lots of animations, colours, props and text elements can be enticing, a crowded video can quickly become overwhelming and distract from the actual content. Keep your design clear and only use elements that can convey your information.
- Prioritise your content: Determine which objects or clips are essential to understanding and prioritise them in your video.
- Group information: Group related elements visually to make it easier for the learner to understand.
- Use of transitions: Use smooth transitions between scenes to ensure a seamless transition.
- Use of pauses: Incorporate strategic pauses between intense animations to give your learners time to process.
5. Produce short videos in Vyond
The aim is to keep the videos as short as possible – ideally no longer than a few minutes – so that your learners stay interested and watch the video to the end.
Instead of producing an overloaded, short video that contains too much information, consider putting together several shorter videos to form a learning series. Chunky information and videos are particularly beneficial in e-learning as they are easier for learners to digest. They can also be easily integrated into existing training programmes. By using short, concise videos, you can spice up your learning modules and thus enrich the learning experience and make it more effective.
The importance of the revision
A thorough review of your video before publishing is the final step in the editing process. Review your video several times to ensure that it is error-free, that all technical aspects work properly and that it is easily digestible for the target audience.
It is advisable to watch your video several times in its entirety and pay attention to different aspects each time. The first time, you could focus on the audio, the next time on the timing of the animations and finally on the text and transitions. In addition to checking several times, it is advisable to apply the four-eyes principle. Have another person watch your video. External feedback is particularly valuable as it can often highlight things that you may have missed.
If you produce e-learning, WBTs or similar learning materials, you are probably already familiar with this process. You can apply your expertise here in exactly the same way, as e-learnings also often consist of text, visual elements and audio. You can check in your Learning Management System (LMS) whether your video is successful and whether learners are able to watch it all the way through and, if necessary, adapt it to the needs of your learners.
Conclusion
Creating your first Vyond video is an exciting opportunity to communicate your learning material visually. These best practices will prepare you to produce a technically and content-wise compelling video.
Want to dive deeper into video production with Vyond? Get started with our two-hour Vyond Enabling Programme to produce videos efficiently and benefit from our support as a service partner. Let’s get started together!
