How designers and brands are morphing the next era of motion design

Forward Thinking 2025 is a manifesto for bringing humanity into all you do as a creative person. In this piece, James Britton looks at how motion design has become so integral to how we evoke personality through screens, and how the medium could evolve further.

Our consumption of culture is in constant movement. Faster connection speeds have led us to a world where autoplay has quietly become the default – always on, 24/7, across screens of all shapes and sizes. We wake to check a portrait screen, before a day of weaving in and out of windows on a monitor. Later, we settle down to yet another projection – this time to relax – and watch as one screen morphs into the next (likely with another interface tightly in hand).

In both style and speed, motion design today mirrors this constantly changing behaviour. Yet one of the very first examples of the medium, created by Oskar Fischinger in 1938, was far more meditative. An Optical Poem resembled an outer space voyage with hundreds of paper cutouts, lasting over five minutes – a lifetime compared to our current instantaneous visual culture. This is not just about social media, where the eight-second attention span has been well-documented. Instant motion can be found across a growing number of platforms, devices, products and services. Movement is no longer just a design element; brands now have to exist in a permanent state of motion.

Such a shift has had a subtle yet significant impact on the workflows of motion designers. No longer confined to building blocks of logo, typography and colour, motion behaviour has become inseparable from brand identity. Glow, blink, pulse; it makes sense that brands want to take ownership of characteristics that bring humanity into what was once static. Think of Headspace and its slow-breathing character, Ebb, or Nike mimicking the energetic movement of athletes. Motion design can be a transformative element for any brand looking to evoke character, emotion and personality.

It’s a rising tide that specialist practitioners, like digital artist and motion designer Rose Pilkington, have been noticing for a while. “I’ve definitely seen a shift with clients,” says Rose, who has created evolving gemstones for Google, and the “always in motion” gradient of Instagram’s icon. “I think it’s because motion allows for so much more visual expression — you can push the boundaries so much more and really nothing is out of reach. Especially, when it comes to visualising abstract concepts.”

This increasing demand for motion assets has also led to tension in a branding context. Motion, by nature, is fluid and adaptable. Branding is inherently about consistency and repetition. You’d be right in thinking that these two factors are naturally at odds – and now, we’re in need of new expertise to bridge the gap. The demand for originality and a sense of the bespoke remains, but it exists alongside the need to consider the impact of systematic elements – crops, formats and aspect ratios – in the earliest of stages.

As a result, motion behaviours can be quite complex. Whether you’re a studio or a freelancer, you’re probably finding yourself in a world of guidelines, toolkits and templates. Liza Enebeis, creative director and partner at Studio Dumbar/DEPT, likens it to following a recipe: “It's almost like a cookbook, right? A chef has a cookbook, and you can get the ingredients.”

In this context, Dumbar is responsible for the writing of that recipe. Final deliverables feature detailed documents to accompany projects, offering “the tools for people to continue,” as Liza describes. “We’re always aware that we’re being asked to create a system that other people can actually work with.” And just as you can throw in an extra ingredient or two, “you have to leave room for them to play,” she adds. “I think that’s something that also helps guarantee longevity.”

Admittedly, enforcing guidelines can at times seem counterintuitive – figuring out rules first, and then enforcing those limitations during the creative process. But, if you can balance experimentation and restraint, it’ll mean the work feels purposefully built for wherever it’s being seen. “In a lot of projects, people see the work and assume it’s very free, like it's a playground,” Liza continues. “Yet behind it, it's really a beautifully designed system that makes it work… The outside can only look good because it’s well designed on the inside.”

Increasing reliance on motion has created a need for smarter, scalable design, while simultaneously putting pressure on designers to create assets more efficiently. In response, software companies are stepping in to develop features to aid new workflows. One such example is motion graphics software, Cavalry. “Created by animators, born out of a motion design studio,” as its CEO Chris Hardcastle describes, Cavalry is driven by an ethos of “always trying to be completely relevant to artists’ needs,” purposefully building an environment for scalable solutions.

With a unique perspective behind the scenes, Chris is well aware that creatives are spinning multiple plates: “Motion design is a multi-stage process of storyboarding, look development, illustration, animatics, timing, audio, and delivery.” To meet these demands, Cavalry places methodical features at the heart of its software. These include tools offering “the flexibility to combine data from spreadsheets and APIs with our dynamic rendering” and partner apps like Cavalry Control, which “provides a way for creatives to distribute complex and bespoke design systems to their clients”. If that sounds abstract, it should – this is the framework many designers navigate when building motion systems today.

And this more complex relationship between motion designer and client has additionally resulted in fresh debate. As new techniques and workflows become more established, it’s increasingly common for clients to ask for source files as deliverables. Understandably, this is a request some artists and companies are hesitant to accommodate.

“A few years ago, project files would have never been a deliverable asset, but it seems to be more requested now on jobs where the campaign’s outputs are so multi-faceted,” says Rose. This is typically due to the client’s need to modify output for specific specs, but in Rose’s view, “an artist's work should be delivered final and not tampered with”. There’s a strong argument for that point of view. Plenty of designers have seen their work delivered (even with a tight set of guidelines), only to see a wonky cut-and-shut version appear on Instagram.

In the past, the act of handing over source files might have been seen as a threat to independent artists and creative studios, especially if you’re handing over source files that lay bare your techniques and creative IP. Suddenly, you’re not just handing over final deliverables, you're handing over the process – your own learned thinking. You could be forgiven for thinking that, over time, you're going to diminish the value of your service. Next time, that work could be just executed in-house. “I don't necessarily agree on that,” says Liza, however. “It's not competitive. [When you hand over source files] you’re making this thing together, and they are the people that will care for and continue the work. I have a lot of respect for clients, because in the end they know their project better than we do.”

What both sides of this debate demonstrate is the level of commitment and care the motion design community holds to output. And rightly so. Motion design has become a superpower for brands; the pulse of always-on communication. As demand grows, motion design must be met with mutual respect between clients and designers. Clients should hold respect for that creative IP, and the many workflows, guidelines and templates partners are creating on their behalf, while artists focus on bringing ideas to life with clarity and intent. Audiences, too, could benefit from stepping back in appreciation, as we jump off this very screen and onto the next. After all, keeping consistency of branding elements is one thing, but keeping consistency in motion behaviour is a whole new ballgame.