Animation

Computer Animation - The Manufacturing World's Secret Marketing Weapon
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Mike_Efford]Mike Efford

Computer animation is the secret weapon of a select group of smart manufacturers and engineering firms who use it to win major contracts for their companies against tough international competitors.

If your company is still relying on the same old conventional sales support materials to make sales presentations, ignoring the potential of technologies like computer animation, get on board or get left behind.

Industrial manufacturing in the western world is under siege for a variety of reasons, ranging from cheap labour to currency fluctuations to political interference. Therefore it is more important than ever to make full use of technologies like 3D computer animation to market products, designs, and systems. Any marketing strategy used to compete with Asia needs to build on natural advantages that North Americans possess. One of those advantages, overlooked by many industrial manufacturers, is the robust development of computer animation.

3D computer animation was pioneered here, and grew exponentially with huge demand for Hollywood special effects and video games. It acquired a high profile through those applications, which stimulated demand for more, and attracted development capital and talent. An upward spiral resulted, and drove the medium of computer animation to dizzying heights of accomplishment and prominence. And the outward spread of the medium's influence has expanded into the world of industrial manufacturing.

3D animation's CAD (Computer Aided Design) drafting roots make it a natural tool for an industrial company. Yet many companies, including those who actually use CAD software in - house, don't even scratch the surface of the medium's true marketing potential. That is unfortunate. Because while they are well aware of what 3D computer graphics can do for the technical development of a design, they ignore the previously mentioned animation expertise developed in Hollywood and video game applications to communicate a vision. And no other visual medium is quite like 3D animation.

There are many advantages to exploiting the capabilities of this medium that most industrial manufacturers are not aware of.

Just for a moment, think what it would mean for your companys bottom line if you had a powerful, easy - to - use computer animation to do the following for you at your next major sales presentation:

-- Justify a premium price for your product or engineered system

-- Demonstrate quickly and easily how a complex group of components works

-- Reveal your product's inner workings, and inner value

-- Enhance the perceived value of a deceptively simple - looking product

-- Show the importance of a small part in a large, complex system

-- Show a wide range of your company's products within an assembly

-- Demonstrate how liquid flows through a hydraulic system

-- Zoom into a microscopic detail of a component or product

-- Show each stage of a massive development project, in sequence

-- Show how a complex assembly of articulated mechanical parts operates

-- Show how an engineered structure will interface in an environmentally friendly way with the earth

-- Explain and dramatize almost any kind of data

-- Create a high - energy, "cutting - edge technology" impression

Those are just a minute fraction of what computer animation can accomplish in a marketing role. And the list merely describes what animation can do, not how it does it.

A big mistake industrial companies make is to regard 3D animation as just "entertainment", and not as a robust marketing medium, capable of demonstrating the benefits of their technologies to clients, and influencing buyers. But for industrial manufacturers who fully make use of all of its capabilities, 3D computer animation represents the best of both worlds. It is a marketing medium that accurately describes technical concepts with great precision, yet uses the visualization powers perfected in Hollywood to illustrate a technical vision with flair and imagination.

In a world as competitive as today's, it's good to know industrial manufacturers are in a great position to tap into a well developed North American strategic advantage: 3D computer animation.

(c) Copyright - Mike Efford. All Rights Reserved Worldwide.

Mike Efford turns the magic of computer animation into marketing power for his clients. Since 1994 his 3D animation studio, Mike Efford Motion Design, has delivered high quality technical animation and motion graphics to clients across North America. He has worked with a long list of major corporations such as Royal Bank, General Motors, 3M, Thane Marketing, Cognos, Manulife Insurance, and over 50 innovative small businesses, broadcasters and design professionals.

Visit http://www.mike-efford-motion-design.com and discover how YOUR company can use this dynamic marketing medium to your strategic advantage.

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