Motion graphics look simple when they're done right. A logo spins into place, text animates across the screen, data visualizes itself in real time. You watch it and think, "That probably took ten minutes."
No, it did not!
Good motion graphics follow a process that most people never see. After years of building Story Boards AI and working directly with designers, educators, and content creators, I've watched this process play out hundreds of times. The teams that nail it follow specific phases. The ones that don't end up with expensive revisions and missed deadlines.
Phase One: Concept and Strategy
Alex and the Academic Presentation scene 1 shot 1
Before anyone opens After Effects or touches a timeline, you need to answer one question: what's the point?
Motion graphics without purpose are just pretty distractions. I've seen companies spend thousands on elaborate animations that look stunning and accomplish nothing because nobody asked what the viewer was supposed to do, feel, or understand.
Start with the basics. Who's watching this? What do they care about? What action do you want them to take? If you can't answer these in one sentence each, you're not ready to animate anything.
Then figure out your constraints. How long can this be? Where will people watch it (phone screen, billboard, presentation slide)? What's your actual budget, not your fantasy budget? These constraints aren't limitations. They're guardrails that keep the project from spiraling into scope creep hell.
The best motion graphics I've seen at Story Boards AI came from projects where someone took the time to write a creative brief. Not a novel, just a page that outlines the goal, audience, message, tone, and deliverables. This document becomes your north star when someone inevitably suggests adding "just one more animation" three days before the deadline.
Phase Two: Scripting and Storyboarding
Guy holding storyboards in his hands
You can't animate what you can't visualize, and you can't visualize what you haven't planned.
If your motion graphic includes voiceover or text, write the script first. Time it out loud. Motion graphics live and die by pacing, and you can't establish pacing without knowing exactly what you're saying and how long it takes to say it.Storyboarding comes next. This doesn't mean you need to be Pixar. Stick figures work. Rough sketches work. The point is to map out what happens when, how scenes transition, and where the visual emphasis lands.
I've watched designers skip storyboarding to "save time" and then spend three times longer in production fixing timing issues that would have been obvious on paper. Storyboards are cheap. Redoing animation work isn't.
This phase also reveals whether your concept actually works. Sometimes an idea that sounded great in a meeting looks clunky when you try to visualize it frame by frame. Better to discover that now than after you've already built all your assets.
Phase Three: Design and Asset Creation
Now you get to make things look good.
This is where you establish your visual style: color palette, typography, graphic elements, animation style. Are you going flat and minimal? Textured and organic? Bold and geometric? Whatever you choose needs to align with your brand and resonate with your audience.
Create your assets with animation in mind. If you're designing in Illustrator or Photoshop, organize your layers properly. Name them something sensible. Future you (and anyone else touching this file) will be grateful you didn't leave everything as "Layer 47" and "Shape 3 copy copy final.
"Build more assets than you think you need. Having extra visual elements gives you flexibility during animation. Nothing kills momentum like stopping mid-animation because you realize you need one more icon or background element.Audio matters more than people think. Find your music, voiceover, or sound effects during this phase. Animation timing often follows audio cues, so having your sound locked down before you start animating saves massive headaches later.
At Story Boards AI, we've seen countless projects where someone animated everything perfectly, then slapped music on at the end that didn't match the pacing. Now they're either re-timing the whole project or living with animation that fights against its own soundtrack. Don't be that person.
Phase Four: Animation and Production
This is where motion graphics actually become motion graphics.
Start with your keyframes. These are the main poses or positions in your animation. Get the timing and spacing right at this stage. Fast movements feel energetic. Slow movements feel deliberate. Uneven pacing feels amateurish.Use easing. Nothing in real life moves at constant speed. Objects accelerate and decelerate. Animation without easing looks robotic and cheap. After Effects has built-in easing curves. Learn how they work. Use them liberally.
Layer your animations. Not everything should move at once. Stagger your timing so elements enter and exit in a rhythm that guides the viewer's eye. This is how you create visual hierarchy in motion.
Animate with purpose. Every movement should either convey information, direct attention, or reinforce your message. If an element is moving just because you know how to make it move, cut it. Motion for motion's sake is clutter.
Work in passes. Do your main animations first. Then add secondary motion. Then polish with details. Trying to perfect each element before moving to the next is a great way to never finish your project.
Phase Five: Review and Revision
Your first render will have problems. Everyone's does.
Watch your animation on the device where people will actually see it. Phone screens reveal issues that look fine on a 27-inch monitor. Projectors show different problems than computer displays
Get fresh eyes on it. You've been staring at this for hours or days. You're blind to obvious issues. Someone who hasn't seen it before will immediately spot that typo, timing problem, or visual hiccup you've been missing.
Expect revisions, but establish limits. Unlimited revision rounds turn into endless tweaking that improves nothing while costing everything. At Story Boards AI, we typically build two revision rounds into projects. That's enough to catch real issues without descending into subjective preference arguments about whether that logo should bounce twice or three times.
Technical review matters too. Check your export settings. Verify your resolution, frame rate, and codec match what you need for delivery. Test your file where it will actually be used. A motion graphic that looks perfect on your computer but won't play on the client's website is a failed project.
Phase Six: Delivery and Documentation
Export your final files in every format you might need. Web, social media, and presentation files all have different requirements. Creating these variants now is easier than trying to recreate them six months later when someone needs the Instagram version.
Archive your project files properly. Save your source files, assets, and project notes somewhere you can find them again. You will need to make changes or create variations eventually. Don't make your future self hunt through unmarked folders trying to reconstruct how you built something.
Document what you learned. What worked? What would you do differently? These notes become your playbook for the next project. Every motion graphic project teaches you something about pacing, timing, or technical workflow. Capture that knowledge while it's fresh.
The Reality of the Process
Motion graphics production isn't linear. You'll jump between phases. You'll realize during animation that your storyboard was wrong. You'll discover during review that you need to redesign an asset. That's normal. The phases aren't a rigid sequence. They're a map that keeps you from getting completely lost.
The teams that consistently produce quality motion graphics treat this process seriously. They don't skip phases to save time because they know it doesn't save time. It creates expensive problems later.
They also know when to break the rules. Sometimes you need to animate first and storyboard later. Sometimes you revise the concept halfway through production because you discovered something better. Following the process doesn't mean being inflexible. It means having a structure to deviate from intentionally rather than thrashing around hoping inspiration strikes.
Motion graphics combine design, animation, storytelling, and technical execution. Getting all those elements to work together takes planning, skill, and attention to detail. But when you nail it, you create something that communicates complex ideas in seconds, holds attention in a world full of distractions, and makes people actually want to watch your content.
That's worth the effort.
