MARSS Promerc – 3D Animated Container Ship

A short excerpt from a video we produced for MARSS Promerc promoting a software project related to modern day piracy at sea. Due to the nature of the project, the actual software itself is confidential and – unfortunately for us – means that we can only share a few sections of the final video, such as this 3D animated container ship.

To create this portion of the video we started by looking for stock 3D models that loosely fit the brief, such as the container ship itself. We then modified those stock assets heavily to suit the needs of our client, reducing time and cost in comparison to making 3D models from scratch. With the container ship ready, we created bespoke models for the small boat and the pirates, and some other sequences not shown here. After the 3D models were completed, they were textured, lit and then animated in line with the actions in the script. The whole process took around three weeks in man-hours, although the work was spread out over several months.

Because of the amount of time required, 3D animation costs more than most other types of video, such as live action video or 2D animation. However, in this instance, 3D animation proved to be far more affordable than hiring a container ship and filming a mock pirate attack. In the scheme of things we were able to keep within a fairly modest budget and still deliver an exceptionally high quality result that fulfilled the needs of our client.