Why use Manim & not an animation tool: The Reasoning
Why choose to animate with code rather than a purpose-built tool?
The reason is I can’t draw to save my life. I’ve tried, I’ve practiced, yet I’m still kind of shit. So, when it came time to make a simple promo video for my company, I had a problem: I needed an animation of my company logo.
The solution is either to spend years improving my art skills or to attempt to do it all in code. Given that I don’t plan on taking up any new hobbies, Manim was the obvious choice.
Why not use image-to-video AI?
- AI art is still in a grey zone of theft and still lacks respect towards artists.
- You can’t have legal ownership over an AI-generated asset.
- AI video still looks bad; it can’t get physics right, plus it’s stuck with weird glitching and contrast.
- It can’t be copyrighted.
Its also expensive
Manim Over Matter: Trading Sketch Pads for Python Scripts
This was my first time giving Manim a proper go. I played around with it in the past but never actually attempted to make something complete. So, now was the time.
Part one, getting a base. For this I went into Inkscape & cleaned up the SVG version of the logo, simplifying it & making it grayscale.
Part two: making the animation. Now with the logo in the IDE, it’s time to figure out how to animate it.
Part three: this took far longer than I thought. I would make some progress and then have it all washed away when I tried to fix something else. But got it working in the end.
The biggest problem I’ve had was making the outline smooth. I’ve tried troubleshooting, first thinking it was a problem with the SVG. Then, when that didn’t fix it, on to debugging the code.
This was an embarrassingly long time. But it got done.
It’s coming together. Kind of—but it is
After an hour or two of banging my head against a brick wall, it was time to reset. Go back to square one with the SVG & redo it all.
This turned out to be what I needed. I still don’t know what caused the original problems. I don’t know what I did to cause the spikes, but after starting over, they are gone. Just like that, hours of effort are fixed. All I had to do was rewrite the entire file, but that only took about ten minutes.
Now that we have a functioning animation of the logo, it’s time to make it look good. This is the part that I was looking forward to the most. First, I wanted to make it look like the logo was on a frosted glass card, and second, I wanted the logo to glow like a neon sign.
Making the glow effect and frosted card effect was much more intuitive. Especially compared to fixing the animation. I was able to knock out both effects in under an hour. Getting the glow to interact with the card took a bit, but it sells the glowing effect much better.
Creation: The fun part
Having finally gotten the animation to a point of good enough. It was time for editing & Foley. For this, I am well versed with audio but know nothing about video editing. So, I tackled the editing first. I decided to give CapCut a try since they have a free browser version.
This was surprisingly good & a fun process. CapCut felt natural and not too obtuse or in the way. While I noticed it lacks some tools I would have liked, you can probably get around that with enough skill.
With the video blocked out, it was time for audio, my favorite part. Since I was young, I have been into music production. So, I was already familiar with audio editing and liked to use Ableton Live. For the sound effects, I went for a stylized vintage CRT TV turning on and then off.
Having completed the audio with sound effects from Capcut edited in Ableton. It was time to combine all the parts together.
Learnings: What’s been learned
- Manim is powerful but not as straightforward as I expected, & SVGs are annoying.
- The rise of CapCut makes sense after trying it. I honestly think a lot of other software could learn from the simple design language and UX.
- It was nice using Python on a more creative-focused project instead of making something technical. It gave me more of an appreciation for the language.
Check out the finished video with audio at: Watch the Manim animation on Facebook
See It In Action
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