Animated Video Production Company FAQ

Table of Contents

Do you want to hire an animated video production company but aren’t sure how to get started? Video Igniter’s FAQ about animated video production companies has answers to help you get your project going!

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Content:

1). What does it cost to hire an animated video production company?

2). How do you work with an animated video production company?

3). How do I choose the right animated video production company for my project?

4). How can I save money on my production budget when working with an animated video production company?

For answers to all these questions and more, read on!

If you have a question about animated video production companies that isn’t answered in this article, you can use our contact form to ask your question or click the image below to schedule a call with a member of our production team:

What does it cost to work with an animated video production company?

Prices vary widely based on the size of your project. For context, feature length PIXAR animated movies cost +$100,000,000 to produce a ~90 minute movie. The illustration and animation cost for an episode of The Simpsons used to be +$20,000 per minute. Hiring an independent animated video production company typically costs between $3,000-$50,000 to create a 60 second animation. 3D animation costs can easily be 3-10x higher.

How long does it take to make a video when working with an animated video production company?

Depends on the length of your project and whether you’re creating 2D or 3D animation. Here are some data points to give you some context:

A 60 second 2D animated video can be produced in 3-8 weeks.
A 60 second 3D animated video can be produced in 3-15 weeks.

There are many ways to speed up production for projects over 3-5 minutes. If you have questions about how long it will take to make your animated video, use our get a quote form to let us know what you want to accomplish and we will follow up with some production options.

How do I choose the right animated video production company for my project?

Picking the right animated video production company to make your video is a key decision in the animated video production workflow.

Here are some resources to help you find the right animated video production company to produce your animation’s ideal visual style, on time and within your budget:

9 Things to Look For When Hiring An Animator to create an animated video.
How to hire an animator?
How to outsource an animated video project?
Pros and Cons of Different Animation Styles
What goes into production cost of an animated video?
Learn the types of online animated video makers.
What’s the difference between hiring an animation studio, a freelance animator and Video Igniter?
What is Video Igniter Animation?
Need your video fast? Learn about rush delivery.

What is the process like working with an animated video production company?

After you’ve selected an animated video production company to help you create your video, here is an overview of what the typical production process looks like:

Questionnaire

Production kicks off with a call and or a questionnaire to learn more about the video you want the animated video production company to create. This is the opportunity to explain:

What information you want to communicate in the video?
Who your target audience is & how to speak to them?
What animated visual style do you want to use for your video?

Script

After you’ve defined the goals and criteria for your project, it’s time to write the script. You can write it yourself or you can hire your animated video production company to create it for you. They will send you the first draft of the script to review and collect your feedback. Send them your revision notes and they will update the script according to your requests.

Check out this article for tips on how to review your script.

Storyboard

After your script is approved, the animated video production company will create your storyboard. The storyboard is like the blueprint for your animation. It tells the illustrators what art to create and it tells the video animators how to put it all into motion. You will get an opportunity to review the storyboard and share your feedback. Focus on the visual storytelling aspects. Are the ideas easily understood? Is there enough detail in the storyboard for the production team to understand what you want to create? After you send your feedback to your producer, the animated video production company will review your notes, incorporate the edits and send the storyboard back to you for review and approval before moving forward with production.

VoiceOver

The animated video production company you are working with will help you audition voiceover artists for your video. Typically, they will send over 1-3+ auditions from people who have recorded the first few sentences of your script. Let the production company know which option you like best. They will oversee recording of the full voiceover and coach the talent through the pacing, tone, energy and pronunciation of difficult words. You will get an opportunity to review the full voiceover before approving it for production.

Soundtrack

The production company you are working with will identify a handful of soundtracks they feel will enhance the presentation of your animated video. Give them a listen and let them know which option(s) you prefer so they can buy the license to use the music in your video. If you can’t tell which soundtrack you like best, let them know and they can help you preview your favorite options when the first draft of your animated video is ready to watch.

Illustration

Creating the illustrations for your video starts with the creation of concept art. Your animated video production company needs to know exactly what your animation will look like before they spend the time creating all of the custom illustrations for your video. To do this, they start by creating concept art – sometimes referred to as a “style frame.”

The art director will review your branding, your storyboard and any style references you may have provided earlier. Then, they will take a key scene from your storyboard and create illustrations for it using one or more unique visual styles.

Review the concept(s) and tell the art director how you feel about them.

If you love one of them as-is, they will begin creating all of the rest of the art to match that style.

Maybe you like one of the styles but it needs some minor changes – the art director will polish up the illustration to your liking and then oversee the creation of the rest of the art.

If you like multiple concepts, the art director can combine your favorite aspects from the different concepts into a new style frame.

Once all the art is created, you will get an opportunity to review it and request revisions before approving the art for production.

Animation

Finally – the magic can begin! Everything has been approved and the animators can get to work. It takes about one week to create a 60 second animation. When the first draft is ready, give it a detailed review with your team. Collect everyone’s feedback and share it with your animated video production company so they can incorporate the edits and render the final draft.

Post Production & Special Edits

Sometimes projects have extra requirements like translating the video to a new language, rendering out different sizes of the video for various social media platforms and adjusting the length to be longer or shorter than the original edit. Now that the first version of the video is approved, the animated video production company can take the time to address the special production requests.

What are some of the top animated video production companies?

Pixar

About: The PIXAR animated video production company was originally founded in 1979 to help develop computer graphics animation for Lucasfilm. In 1986, Apple co-founder Steve Jobs invested in PIXAR because he saw the potential to develop the company into a full computer animated video production company. 20 years later, after producing blockbuster successes like Toy Story, A Bug’s Life, Finding Nemo and Monster’s Inc, Disney bought Pixar to incorporate into their production team.

Year Established: 1979 / 1986

Project Budget Range: $30,000,000-$200,000,000 for feature length films

Studio Ghibli

Year Established: 1985

About: Famous Japanese animated video production company Studio Ghibli is known for producing detailed, lifelike animations and rich stories for movies like My Neighbor Totoro, Kiki’s Delivery Service and Howl’s Moving Castle.

Project Budget Range: $11,000,000-$34,000,000 for feature length films

Walt Disney Animation

Year Established: 1923

About: Established 100 years ago, the Walt Disney Animation Studio initially took the world by storm with animations featuring characters like Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck. Fast forward a hundred years and Disney Animation has developed countless famous films that are known around the world.

Project Budget Range: $20,000,000-$260,000,000 for feature length films

Video Igniter Animation

Year Established: 2011

About: Video Igniter was founded to bring animation to the masses. Working with animation studios is a long, expensive and complicated process. Video Igniter simplifies the animated video production process while lowering the cost to produce high quality custom animated videos.

Project Budget Range: $1,000-$25,000/minute.

What are the pros and cons of working with an animated video production company

Pros:

They can make any kind of video you can imagine

They can make long and short videos

Cons:

They’re more expensive to work with than a freelance video animator.

How can I save money on my production budget when working with an animated video production company?

Write Your Script

You can save hundreds or thousands of dollars off of your animated video’s production cost by writing the script yourself. Your script doesn’t have to be perfect; if you can write the first draft of your script, your animation production team can help you polish it to make it production ready. Here are some resources to help you write the script for your animated explainer video:

How to write a script for an animated video.

Examples of explainer video scripts.

Tips to supercharge your video script writing.

Download our free script writing template.

Create Your Storyboard

Making the storyboard for your animated video is another way you can save hundreds or thousands of dollars off the cost of your video. Use our free downloadable storyboard creation PDF and check out these resources to help you create your own storyboard:

What is a storyboard? And why do you need one?

How to create a storyboard for an animated video?

Tips for building a great storyboard for your video.

Download our free storyboard creation template.

Record The VoiceOver

Did you know you can record professional sounding voiceovers in the office or at home for free? You don’t need to buy any expensive equipment or fancy software. Just watch 1:31 in this episode of The Video Igniter Show about voiceovers to learn how you can record your own high quality voiceover for free.

Consider Using Stock Assets

Video Igniter makes custom animated videos. But your animated explainer video doesn’t need to be 100% custom designed. It’s possible to use stock assets like icons, text, 3D models, stock images and videos to decrease your production budget.

Use Free (Legal) Music

Incompetech lets people to use their songs in their videos for free – as long as you credit the artist. Facebook’s Sound Collection also offers free music you can use in your animated promotional videos.

Why Hire Video Igniter To Make Your Custom Animated Video?

World class animation and design talent at prices startups can afford.

Check out our portfolio – we can make any kind of 2D or 3D animated video you can imagine.

+20 reasons companies love hiring us to create animated videos.

Animated Video Production Company Demo Reel

Looking For An Animated Video Production Company In The U.S.A.?

Video Igniter is headquartered in Seattle, Washington.

Animated Video Production Company Success Stories And Testimonials

“Video Igniter offered us the critical combination of creative value, clear communication, and patience with stakeholder feedback. We ended up with truly high-quality design assets for our video series largely due to the extra level of commitment — and the right balance of efficiencies with flexibility in the process when called for.”

Larry Schlessinger – Sr. Creative Program Manager, Amazon Web Services

“Video Igniter came to us with a number of creative and engaging ideas and were able to create an exciting, impactful video in a short period of time. And the best part was that it cost much less than other options of similar quality. The video they made is a great marketing tool for us.”

Alex Raymond – Founder, Kapta Systems

“I am beyond satisfied with my experience with Video Igniter. The first drafts of the work were almost exactly what I had in my head when developing the concept. After that each step along the way was seamless until arriving at a perfect finished product. And all this at a tremendous value. Anyone who has considered creating a marketing video should check out Video Igniter.”

Anonymous Customer Feedback

How To Hire Video Igniter The Animated Video Production Company

Schedule a call with our production team to discuss the production of your animated explainer video.

Get a quote for us to create your animated explainer video.

Request access to our newest price sheet.

Create your Video Igniter account, fill out a creative brief, and we’ll start creating your animated explainer video.