Silver Lining Animation in 2022
As we started to approach the end of 2021, we took a look at where we’re headed in the upcoming year. Endless covid variants and lockdowns aside, 2021 has been a good year for us as a studio, and we achieved many of the long-term goals we’ve had since starting the studio back in 2017—so where do we go from here?
We’ve taken stock of what’s important to us as a business and as individuals and have laid out the following goals for the upcoming year, and we thought we’d share them for full transparency. If you think you could help us to meet any of our goals, or if there is something we can help you with, get in touch!
Reducing Environmental Impact
Businesses have an environmental responsibility, which we have always taken seriously. We’re actually fairly low-impact already as a business, at least in the grand scheme of things (we don’t operate any factories and aren’t launching things into space), but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be looking to improve. The key area we’ve identified for improvement is travel emissions. Last November, we challenged ourselves to a “No Drive” month, and even in the midst of snowstorms, it went great!
We plan to carry this forward as a permanent challenge to our team, encouraging everyone who is able to walk, cycle, or use public transport to get to work. We haven’t figured out an incentive for this yet but will get something in place soon.
We also plan to continue a WFH/office split, reducing the amount of travel that needs to take place. Wherever possible, we are embracing online meetings in lieu of travelling distances that would necessitate the use of transportation. For networking opportunities and meetings that must be in person and are too far away to reach by foot, travelling by car will be a last resort.
Social Impact
Having a positive impact on the area we work and live in is something else we place great importance on. Over the last few years, we’ve worked with schools, colleges, and universities to offer as many learning and work experience opportunities as we can facilitate. This is something we intend to continue, expanding the number of placements we can provide. In addition to this, we are also looking to expand the number of speaking events and guest lectures that we give, so please get in touch if you can help make this happen.
It’s not just those in education that we want to work with, but also our fellow businesses. When we started our studio in 2017, we benefited from the support offered to us by organisations such as Teesside Launchpad and Digital City, as well as the businesses who took the time to give us advice. We love to return this favour by giving guest talks and running workshops, so again, please do get in touch if you want us to take part in anything!
Developing our own IP
It’s long been a goal of ours to create animated videos using our own intellectual property in the form of short film projects. Over the years, we’ve developed a few stories that we want to tell in varying levels of detail. We have a short film in the early development stages, and hope to pitch for funding later in the year.
For a while now we’ve also been creating educational videos on YouTube, choosing topics that we find interesting and explaining them through animation. In addition to being fun to research and make, they also provide us with an opportunity to experiment with new techniques and animation styles. While fitting these projects into our busy production schedule can be difficult at times, we plan to produce a few more over the next year and continue to grow their audience.
Business Progress
In 2021 we’ve been lucky enough to work with some incredible organisations including NHS England, charity organisations, universities, and plenty of amazing and innovative businesses. It goes without saying that we want to continue this pattern into the next year, and we pride ourselves in our diverse client list and video topics.
In the next year we are aiming to increase our educational portfolio and work with both public and private education providers, as well as charity organisations.
We have also recently begun to expand our marketing-focused offerings to include animated Web icons and staff profile pictures. This type of content can be offered at a much lower cost than a full-length explainer video and can give people a taste of our animation at a lower cost. In addition to these services being available directly from ourselves, we also plan to partner with various marketing agencies to offer them as part of larger packages.
In conclusion
We have high hopes for 2022 and beyond, not just for our business performance but for our creative development and the positive impact that we can make in our community. Once again, if you think you could help us reach any of our goals, or if we can help you, then get in touch!
