“Framing sound” Motion poster
PHOTOSENSITIVE WARNING—CONTAINS FLASHING LIGHTS
DISCLAIMER: All musical artists referenced in this case study are a point of inspiration, they are not endorsing the work and it is in no way connected to them in an official or legal capacity.
The pieces should also not act as an endorsement of the artists themselves.
Concept:
This video features six animations, each inspired by a different musical artist and an album of theirs. Each animation is meant to be a visual representation of the artist’s aesthetic, history, and impact.
Each artist is given a title to give context to the direction of the animation, and to include an added challenge of manipulating text and creating cohesion with copy, type treatment, motion style, as well as the visual style.
I enjoy listening to a range of music, and so this poster reflects that range to capture each artist’s individuality and expand my skills in different contexts.
Jobs:
Animation
Ideation (Brand, Message, Ecosystem)
Creative Direction
Composition
Editing
Optimization
Revision
Researcher
Process:
Much of this process was an exploration of different effects and techniques, so rather than having a set direction at the start, it was a process of gathering information, then listening to the album itself as I worked.
Visualizations of the audio and history came about through brainstorming adjectives—I would listen to the music on the album and write down as many descriptive words as possible. I asked questions like “how did the artist feel when they made this piece?”, “how can I describe the sounds?”, and “what is the intended feeling of listening to the album?”
Those adjectives guided my process and design decisions.
1. Unifier
Inspired by Porter Robinson’s album, “Nurture.”
A representative song from “Nurture” by Porter Robinson.
Music-to-Animation Descriptors:
• Natural/Unnatural Juxtaposition
• Bright
• Loving
• Determination
• Playful/Serious Juxtaposition
Process:
The music in Porter Robinson’s “Nurture” is a combination of electronic and acoustic sounds, and I believed the purpose of that is to create a more expressive representation of reality, one that is hard to pinpoint but has a lot of impact and positivity—a very welcome change from the monotony and fear of COVID-19, which was when the album was released. It is an album of love and perseverance in a particularly difficult time.
The album has very slow and personal moments, as well as very hyper and electronic moments, so I wanted to capture that range with a gradient containing a large range of color, most of it being bright but still containing some darker colors to reflect those darker moments that are acknowledged but spun into positivity in the album. The animation of the circles mimics stylized but relatively realistic physics, but with gravity intentionally removed to represent the elevating feel of the music and illustrate the combination of acoustic and nonacoustic sounds. The album, in my eyes, was created for listeners to feel heard and feel more empathy towards others, which is how I ended up with the title “Unifier” for this animation.
A frame from the animation.
2. Echoer
Inspired by Yung Lean’s album, “Warlord.”
***EXPLICIT CONTENT WARNING*** A representative song from “Warlord” by Yung Lean.
Music-to-Animation Descriptors:
• Aggressive
• Cold
• Atmospheric
• Solitude
• Boastful/Flashy
Process:
Yung Lean’s “Warlord” is significantly different from the “Nurture”—it is a cold collection of heavy bass and spacey production that takes a different approach to hip hop, an approach I find more expressive than a lot of what was in the mainstream at the time. It is very braggy, harsh, and generally unapologetic, which I found to be an intriguing style to capture in animation.
I thought of the concept of a gradient, how it is a gradual progression of pixel HSVs from start to end. “Warlord” features very little easing into something that may be grating or intense to listeners, so the noise in the background came from intense and immediate black-to-white in an attempt to represent the unforgiving nature of the music, as well as a representation of the heavy compression and distortion throughout. The lettering was made to shine like metal, combining the grit and intensity of such a strong material with the boastful nature of owning and displaying large, shiny metallic things like jewelry and cars. The entire animation shakes rapidly to make the viewer feel as though they are in an earthquake or being shaken by something particularly intense. The production throughout the album is done in a way that makes the vocals sound like they come from a large, echoing room, hence the name “Echoer.”
A frame from the animation.
3. metanxietist
Inspired by Yeule’s album, “Glitch Princess.”
***EXPLICIT CONTENT WARNING*** A representative song from “Glitch Princess” by Yeule.
Music-to-Animation Descriptors:
• Emotional
• Devastating
• Expressive
• Robotic
• Electric
Process:
This album is certainly not for everone. Yeule’s “Glitch Princess” describes a woman with severe mental health issues struggling with herself and her love life. The album features heavy processing and artificial sounds in the vocals and instrumental, appearing to come from a robotic presence that feels human emotion and pain. Yeule uses technology as a means of expressing feelings that feel heavily unnatural and are both dangerous and delicate.
I began my process of representing the album in a rather literal way—I found footage of an actor crying and rotoscoped it, being sure to eliminate a lot of identifiably human characteristics. I moved the eyes higher up on their face to add to the uncanny valley, something that appears human but isn’t quite.
A frame from the animation.
Footage of an actor crying was rotoscoped with most of the identifiable features, excluding the eyes, being removed.
The colors and effects were all created to add to the atmosphere, using dark and light values to add contrast and drama. Lines were used and randomized in their x position with heavy distorting effects to create something that is equal parts rain falling and VHS band distortion. Similar effects were used on the figure to give a glitchy, malfunctioning, and abstracted appearance. The music itself was not made to be in any way accessible to a wide audience, so I represented that by the most artistic/difficult word I could think of to represent a sense of anxiety in the modern digital world.
4. Grid-shifter
Inspired by Iglooghost’s album “Neo Wax Bloom.”
A representative song from “Neo Wax Bloom” by Iglooghost.
Music-to-Animation Descriptors:
• Hyper
• Eccentric
• Chaos
• Creativity
• Comical
Process:
Iglooghost’s album “Neo Wax Bloom” is pure chaos—electronic music featuring constant unrelated sounds and pitched-up vocals that aren’t meant to be heard, it really is an enigma. It felt like a perfect challenge for this collection.
Many of the songs on this album lull you into a false sense of security, occasionally having a sound or two that feels out of place before ultimately diving into the deep end of pure electronic nonsense, both delightful and comical. I used that to guide the direction of the animation.
The style I adopted for this has a kind of faux 3D to give the solid white background a sense of unnatural space, taking inspiration from the cover art. The movement here uses a lot of squash and stretch, motion blur, and other classic principles for cartoon-styled animation. This music I find comparable to a cartoon of sorts, featuring a kind of zany adventure with bright sounds. Where this is different, however, is that the music is not made for children. I created a floating eyeball in space that is threatened by sharp objects from all around to give a sense of the unapproachable yet creative nature of the music. The music sounds to me like a blank canvas being constantly manipulated with bright colors mimicking the various sound palettes, bursting with energy like a cartoon would. The title of “Grid-Shifter” comes from the general form of the music falling out of a lot of structure and music theory, in a sense changing the grid that helps elements align into a far more freeform kind of expression.
A frame from the animation.
5. Disrupter
Inspired by SOPHIE’s album, “Oil of Every Pearl’s Un-Insides”
A representative song from “Oil of Every Pearl’s Un-Insides” by SOPHIE.
Music-to-Animation Descriptors:
• Otherworldly
• Trance
• Mesmerizing
• Fearful
• Uneasy
• Natural/Unnatural juxtaposition
Process:
Any fan of SOPHIE’s work will know the impact of this album on how people express themselves in more artful ways, so I knew I wanted to include a piece based around this album. It feels wholly unique, jumping back and forth song-to-song from an exaggerated and eccentric kind of pop music and something that sounds like a soundtrack for an atmospheric horror movie. The sounds used in this album are generally inspired by organic sounds, like a water droplet falling into a pool, or rubber squeaking, but recontextualized in a unique way. The highs and lows of the album led me to the bright, heavily saturated colors going along with black and darker values. The form used has a set of effects on it made to appear slightly more organic than a digitally created vector shape, aiming to have the same juxtaposition the album does with natural and unnatural sounds. You are also made to feel as though you are falling into something endless, matching the drone and repetition present throughout the album like a kind of unending dread, though a kind of dread that feels creative and trippy at the same time. SOPHIE herself was a disrupter in the music industry, so the title seemed fitting for that reason.
A frame from the animation.
6. CRUSHER
Inspired by Crystal Castles’ album, “Amnesty (I)”
A representative song from “Amnesty (I)” by Crystal Castles.
Music-to-Animation Descriptors:
• Artificial
• Lo-fi
• Aggressive
• Moody/Atmospheric
• Drone
• Despair
• Cold
Process:
Crystal Castles is a controversial band, as the male member of the band has serious allegations for actions against the female member. The music they created ranges from aggressive to depressed, and listening to it after the allegations have come out gives the music a new level of authenticity that is uncomfortable and intense. I wanted to capture the shift in my feelings towards their music after the allegations, which I have done through this animation.
The music is very cold in general, lacking any kind of acoustics or unprocessed vocals to give it an otherworldly sound. For this reason, I made the background solid black. I imposed footage of an eye on footage of a flower wilting, representing the horrible relationship of the band members and my attitude towards the music. You are listening to something crushing, so this seemed to be fitting (this is also where the title comes from). Many effects are used in this animation to capture the digital processing of the audio itself, utilizing griddler and chromatic abberation to alter footage of reality into something that could only ever exist in a digital medium.
A frame from the animation.
All work created in Adobe Photoshop 2025, Adobe Illustrator 2025, and Adobe After Effects 2025.