01Diagrams have no interior
Boxes and arrows cannot show what happens inside the equipment, which is exactly what has to be judged: how the bed tumbles, how heat is exchanged, how material is reduced.
INDUSTRY / PROCESS
3D animation for chemical and process plants
A process flow diagram shows which machine the material passes through. It cannot show what happens inside. Animation opens the internals, the change in material state and the sequence at the same time.
The hard part of process industries is continuity: material passes from one machine into the next with no real break, yet a presentation needs chapters. Flow diagrams give boxes and arrows, P&IDs give piping logic, and neither answers what the material looks like at a given moment, where temperature changes, or why a step cannot be skipped. That is the gap animation fills.
WHY IT IS HARD
Process documentation is the worst medium for a process
02Parameters are invisible
Temperature, pressure, residence time and reaction stage decide whether the process works, and on paper they are only numbers. They build no impression in a review meeting.
03You cannot film inside
Heat, pressure, dust and sealed vessels make filming impossible and unsafe. Some stages are never opened while the plant is running.
04Everyone reads it differently
Design institute, owner and operators each understand the same process to a different depth. By the third drawing revision they still disagree, and the process engineer absorbs the cost.
WHAT WE ANIMATE
Shots a process film usually contains
Not a render of the whole line, but three to five process stages fixed first, then broken into shots.
- 01
The full material route
Follow the material from infeed to discharge on one continuous thread. The route is remembered far better than the equipment names.
- 02
Sections through key equipment
Kiln shell and burden, mill rotor and screen, roller press and ring die — only a section explains what the machine is actually doing.
- 03
Change of material state
Powder to granule, wet to dry, lump to aggregate. State change is how a viewer judges which stage they are watching.
- 04
Temperature and reaction zones
Colour bands and state changes turn unseen parameters into visible information, marking heating, holding and reaction zones.
- 05
Splitting and rejoining routes
Where branches divert and where they return is told in separate passages with separate camera positions, never mixed in one shot.
RELATED WORK
Related process work
Public films below — open them to see how the material route runs and where the sections are placed.
DELIVERY
Delivery
- Resolution
- 1080p as standard, 4K on request
- Format
- MP4 / H.264, drops into slides, tender documents and trade-show screens
- Camera language
- Route tracking, equipment sections, parameter overlays
- Modelling input
- Process flow diagrams, equipment drawings or photos, client process data
- Schedule
- About 4–5 days per finished minute, from complete material and an approved script
PRICING
What this kind of project costs
Priced per finished second at 110–250 CNY: about 6.6–15k per minute, 19.8–45k for three minutes. Equipment exteriors and route flow sit at the low end; internal sections, state changes and powder or fluid simulation push towards the high end. The quotation itemises shots.
See the full pricing note ↗FAQ
Three questions process clients ask
We only have part of the process data. Can you still do it?
Yes. The film goes exactly as far as the data does, and where data is missing the picture stays schematic rather than inventing numbers.
The internals are confidential. What if we cannot release drawings?
The usual answer is a schematic section: correct relative positions and motion logic, simplified dimensions and structural detail. Under NDA, redacted drawings work too.
How long does a three-minute process film take?
About 12–15 working days from complete material and an approved script. Most of the front end goes into settling the process order and section positions; leaving that unresolved is what makes rework expensive.
INDUSTRY / PROCESS
Send the process diagram and equipment list
With a flow diagram I can come back with three shot ideas and an approximate duration band; a preliminary quote follows within 30 minutes once material is complete.
Start a projectLET’S MAKE IT CLEAR
The next shot
is your product.
A machine drawing, a paragraph of notes, or an idea that is not shaped yet. We start with what you want the audience to understand.
Start a projectMechanics / Production / ProductKAIFENG, CHINA · EST. 2022