Trying to push this new video podcast concept to the next level, I created an animated show open that would run at the front of each episode. I wanted there to be no doubt who these tutorials were being aimed at, and I think this animation achieves that in a fun, visually interesting way. With nods to Apple products – from the “powering up” sound effect at the beginning, to the stripping of the “genius” factor from the black t-shirt at the end – hopefully I’ve gotten across the message that this is a show geared toward the everyday Apple user and their families.

With nods to Apple products – from the “powering up” sound effect at the beginning, to the stripping of the “genius” factor from the black t-shirt at the end – hopefully I’ve gotten across the message that this is a show geared toward the everyday Apple user and their families.

Very often I’ll get inspiration from a piece of music, and in this case I had already found a track I really liked, so I knew exactly how long I had to read my lines. Having recently closed my New Haven studio, shooting the green screen part of this posed a bit of a challenge. I managed, however, to convert my living room into a temporary shooting space good enough to get the footage I needed to finish the open.

The original logo design was done in Photoshop and all the animation and compositing is After Effects.