Aerosmith Promo Video

Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, and After Effects

This project was an After Effects animation I created during my Motion Graphics 2 class at RIT, featuring the rock band Aerosmith. It was meant to highlight their music as well as their overall aesthetic and feel, combining both in a way that felt well-connected, well-paced, visually interesting, and true to the band.

Project Description

At the initial scamping stage, I knew the general direction I wanted to go in — the video would start and largely be themed around Aerosmith's Rock 'n' Roller Coaster at Disney's Hollywood Studios park, as I thought that this would serve as a good "vehicle" to build anticipation and set the tone of the video.

The scamping stage helped me to better visualize the types of images, effects, text, and pacing I wanted to use in the video, just as a quick way to jot down ideas. Some of these would be used in the final version, but as this and the storyboards will show, many scenes were cut or changed for the final.

First Steps: Ideation & Scamping

After getting some ideas down, I created a moodboard to reflect the visual style of the band, their media (music, music videos, ride) and any typography that may work well for that purpose. This was good to reference when actually working on the final video.

Since Rock 'n' Roller Coaster is a real thing, I also added that to the moodboard, since it was one of my biggest references when making the assets. I looked at ride POVs and photographs to get more details.

Moodboards

After scamping, I created a storyboard to better establish the ideas, audio, and visuals I wanted, with some descriptions underneath each panel to better describe what I wanted to happen. Many of these ideas ended up being reworked or scrapped due to time constraints, so I picked the few songs that I felt would be most important.

"Back In The Saddle" was used for the intro, since this sometimes plays on the real version of the ride at the beginning, and builds a lot of anticipation in the video as well.

"Dream On" was chosen as it is a very iconic and powerful song, and "Love In An Elevator" was chosen for its iconicity and the dynamic visuals I could generate with it (but also because when this song plays on the actual ride, it ends with the line "love on a roller coaster" which is a fun reference I wanted to add, and bookends the entire video well).

Storyboarding & Animatic

Here's a tip — scroll over the PDF to see other pages!

After I had a solid idea of where I wanted to go with my storyboard and animatic, I jumped into Adobe Illustrated and began working on vector panels that could be brought into After Effects and manipulated using its 3D mode. I decided to create the entire video in 3D because I thought it would be a great challenge, and the effects I wanted would look stronger in 3D.

Once many of these panels were completed,

I oriented them with one another in After Effects, and parented the ones that are attached so that they move together (for instance, the coaster train is composed of different front, side, and back panels).

The WIP video shown to the right is what I was able to create for the first round of critique we had. I was disappointed with the final third of the video, as it was a little rushed at the time, but I was glad to see the vision I had take form.

The "Dream On" segment changed from the original idea. I decided to use it as an opportunity to show real footage of the band and how they have stood the test of time, capturing the energy found in their live performances.

WIP Video

After critique and a bit more time, I completed the video. I altered some of the lighting and camera movement to make it more intense, which can especially be seen in the beginning of the video when comparing this to the WIP video. I also decided to add years to the "Dream On" segment, and was able to add lyrics and more dynamic movement to the "Love In An Elevator" segment.

I think this is one of my strongest projects for many reasons; I pushed myself with how I used After Effects, had a very strong idea that I was able to fully develop, created convincing and fluid animation that captured the band's energy, and it showed me that I don't always need to add everything that was in the original concept in order for a piece to be strong, which is something I have struggled with before.

If given an opportunity to improve this project, I would probably learn to 3D model and fully commit to using 3D assets. I would probably also add some of the other ideas that never made it, and add more detail at some of the "flatter" looking sections.

Final Video