For Client: Ascidian Therapeutics 

Mutated genes cause a vast variety of diseases by producing poorly functional proteins. Often the genes are too large to be able to deliver a complete replacement copy to cells, making gene therapy impossible. Ascidian has pioneered a method to identify where a gene is mutated, and only replace that part. This smaller component of the gene can fit into standard gene delivery vehicles, allowing the body’s own gene splicing machinery to make the repair and produce healthy protein.

The technology is based on genetic features of an undersea creature known as ascidians, or “sea squirts.” To produce this mechanism of action animation, we let deep sea themes guide our choices for color, illumination and movement, taking inspiration from jellyfish and other undersea life to guide the aesthetic, all while keeping the actual structures and molecular events scientifically accurate as is always critical in medical animation.

For Client: Alexandria Professional ®

The founder of Alexandria Professional, Lina Kennedy, has decades of empirical evidence showing that her method of hair removal using sugar works permanently in all skin and hair types, but no scientific studies have been performed to explain the mechanism of action. She approached Microverse Studios to help identify the potential microanatomical factors that underly sugaring’s effectiveness, and assemble a cohesive theory to help explain how her technique works. The team at Microverse Studios performed extensive literature research and consulted with an MD/PhD content expert to verify our findings, and then performed live experiments to gather microscopic evidence to support our hypothesis. The end result was a film that explained from start to finish how and why sugaring with proper technique and timing can achieve such remarkable results.

Up-close imagery of skin and hair can easily be visually repelling if one isn’t careful, and so to create the mechanism of action video, the creative team utilized stained glass, paper mâché, and floral motifs to help abstract and beautify the imagery while keeping structures and metabolic processes accurate as is always critical in medical animation.

For Client: CytoTronics

Most imaging methods destroy their cell culture samples in order to take their measurements, rendering live biological parameters impossible to assess over time. For the first time, CytoTronics has developed real-time, nondestructive electrochemical imaging, making it possible to measure not only cell movement and shapes, but also how cells are connected together and their electrophysiological properties such as nerve cell signaling and metabolic activity. This will revolutionize the study of how cells behave, and already has applications in drug development, wound healing neurology, gastrointestinal studies and more.

Creating a scientific animation to tell this story required combining cell biology and cultures with slick, high-tech imagery to describe the physical principles involved. Colors reminiscent of early lightbulbs evoke a sense of the newness of this technology, while prismatic spatial disturbances helped to define the electromagnetic fields the technology uses to achieve its results.

Article By: Cameron Slayden, M.S.

Why Hardware Matters When Making Medical Animation

Medical Animators are only as good as their scientific backgrounds, their skills, and their hardware. The first two take years of hard work and dedication to develop, but I can help you cheat and get the last one right the first time. You’ll see a lot of links to products in this article, but these are included as a matter of convenience and we at Microverse Studios are not affiliated with them in any way other than having salty opinions.

I've done my best in this article to explain what each part of the computer does in relation to our workflow, and what specs I'd look for in a machine built to optimize the production of mechanism of action videos or medical device animations. These types of projects often require the ability to manipulate geometry-heavy scenes, create particle and dynamic systems that can simulate accurate cellular and molecular environments, and import complex molecules, often with thousands of atoms that need to be held in memory and utilized within generator systems. These days, rendering is generally done on a computing array of some type, but GPU rendering has allowed interactive render previews that give medical animators the opportunity to refine their imagery in real time, greatly improving the resulting production quality and streamlining the look development workflow.

I also showed this article to Mike Hickman, Senior Technical 3D artist at Barrow Neurological Institute, who had many very rational suggestions as well. His insights tend to be pretty deep, and I’ve tried to keep this article at a beginner level. For guidance of a depth bordering on brain surgery, definitely reach out to him.

What I will describe is very similar to a killer gaming rig, because the software we use is very similar to gaming software. That being said, unless you or your employer has $5-10k burning a hole in their pocket, you may need to settle for a lower performance somewhere. If you must cut costs, I'd say go with a less expensive CPU with fewer cores but faster clock speed, and you don't have to have the world's fastest disk drive either. If you want to do your best work in a GPU rendering environment such as Redshift, Octane or Arnold, GPU and RAM are the two things you never want to skimp on. If you’re not surfing the wave of the future and don’t do much GPU rendering, then just max out the RAM. Photoshop will thank you.

The combination of specifications I’ve assembled attempts to strike the best balance between cost and performance. Except maybe for the Zero Gravity Chair.

Choosing an Operating System (OS) You Can Build With

Many of the medical illustration programs use mac, however if you’re out in the world and want to produce medical animation, go PC. It’s a fraction of the cost of a similarly equipped Mac, and generally plays better with animation software and GPU hardware in my experience. The transition isn’t that bad. I made it, and you can too. You just gotta jump in.

It’s also easy to upgrade and swap out parts in a PC, or, if you’re bold like I was in my younger years, build one yourself. However, these days I prefer Polywell to build all of my machines. I’ve heard anecdotes of companies charging an arm and a leg for custom builds and having poor customer support and shoddy workmanship, but I’ve worked with Polywell for fifteen years and they are rock-solid consistent. I’ve had them build over a dozen machines, and they'll design one to fit your specs and work hard to fit your budget. Their cable management is obsessive, which makes after-market upgrades much easier, and their warranty and customer support are stellar. Jimmy Vong is my guy: jimmy(at)polywell.com. Tell ‘em Cameron sent you.

At Microverse Studios, our medical animators use Maxon One and Adobe Creative Suite in a PC environment. Different software packages may make various use of components, (particularly CPU/GPU), so this article is written with our software combination in mind. If, in addition to creating 3D scientific animation, you’re also planning to use this marvel of engineering and design to play Tetris or Dark Souls or whatever the kids are playing these days, well that’s between you and your God.

Central Processing Unit (CPU)

The CPU is used by literally every function in the computer, but some functions in the software rely exclusively on it and will therefore benefit the most from its enhancement. CPU is used for generators in C4D-- volume builders/meshers, real-time polygon subdivision, cloners, etc. all use CPU to calculate the procedural geometry in the scene before rendering each frame either in the editor or renderer. It’s also used to process most particle systems and dynamics, and to generate caches. Slower CPU speeds will result in slower frame updates while you work, which can be pretty frustrating.

Additionally, CPU is intensively used in After Effects, and an enhanced CPU can greatly improve After Effects performance regardless of GPU. This breakdown, courtesy of Puget Systems via the indispensable Mike Hickman, shows the kind of performance enhancements that can be experienced.

Get as many cores as you can (simultaneous calculations possible), at the highest clock speed you can (calculations per second per core), within reason. You'll find there's a price point where increased costs are no longer linearly correlated with increased performance. That's the sweet spot. Mike Hickman suggested that there are other great articles at Puget Systems that can help you dive down the rabbit hole if you want to really explore your options. Me? I just ask Jimmy.

Graphics Processing Unit (GPU)

As of January 2023, go with GTX 3080 or equivalent or above. Don't settle. If you can afford more than one, get more than one. GPU is used by Redshift for the nearly-real-time interactive preview renderer, which is critical for developing the look of your work. It's also used for final rendering, which again you don't want to happen slowly if you're doing it locally. It's also used to display the scenes calculated by the CPU, which you'll want to happen fast while you work. Finally, it's used for many plugins in After Effects, which you want to be as close to real-time as possible to keep you from pulling your hair out while you work. While a slower CPU might add seconds to update a frame in Cinema 4D during playback, once that’s done, your GPU allows you to navigate the scene and objects. A slower GPU will make your interface choppier whether or not animation is currently playing.

Memory (RAM)

I recommend a minimum 32G for a smooth working experience, but 64G+ is optimal. This component controls how many programs you can use at once, how many objects you can have in a given scene, how big a scene you can even open in C4D, and how many tabs you can have open at once in Chrome. If your medical animations are all heavily composited with 32bit .exr multilayer monstrosity frames that are a gigabyte each, this is a feature you want to max out. No amount of RAM is too much.

C: Drive

I recommend a solid state NVMe C: drive (the one the OS is installed on), because it's extremely fast. Again, your work experience should include as little time spent waiting as possible. 256G minimum, larger recommended, especially if you plan to game on this monster you’re building. A lot of software will save caches in weird hidden folders on your C drive, so having more space will decrease the frequency with which you have to hunt those folders down to empty out. Solid state is also less susceptible to impact damage than a traditional drive, and NVMe drives are all solid state. I’m not saying I’ve ever dropped one of my computers (I’m also not saying’ I’ve not ever dropped one), but the world's a dangerous place, so why take chances?

D: Drive (and so on)

Regardless of the size of your C: drive, I recommend having a secondary D: drive to hold all your build files, renders, caches, etc., and backing that up to Dropbox or some other online storage account. It will prevent accidentally eliminating your computer’s ability to boot by filling the hard drive too full with those 1 gig frames, and if something bad happens to your C drive, all those precious medical animation frames and files remain intact. If something bad happens to your work drive, it's backed up to the cloud, so there's no problem. Dropbox also has a handy function that lets your files exist online-only, which lets you easily and losslessly clear local disk space when you’re running low. Mike Hickman likes to have a third drive dedicated solely to caches, which is probably a good idea if you’re willing to track them all down. Of course, he uses the massively multilayered 32 bit .exr file type specifically designed to paralyze computers, so he would say that. Regardless, I recommend that the D: disk et cetera be internal drives, because more bad things "happen" outside computers than inside. Again, go with solid state even if you don’t do NVMe for the sake of speed and toughness.

Power Supply Unit (PSU)

1500 watts should cover the gigantic GPUs you've definitely included in your build (right? ಠ_ಠ). You can go 750w or 1000w with a single GPU if you never plan to expand, but regardless ask Jimmy to make you a recommendation. That guy knows his stuff.

Regarding Cases

I recommend keeping the case as small as possible to hold the GPU of your dreams. I have had some absolutely ridiculously large cases. I can tell you that they don’t add anything to the user experience, and the added weight makes rearranging your office a pain.

Why Have Two or Three Little Monitors When You Can Have One Giant One?

I have a 40" monitor I got from Amazon for ~$800. If you can afford it, get one big monitor. Once you do, you will never, ever go back to multiple small monitors. Mike Hickman made the important point that it’s risky to have a single point of failure for your visual interface, potentially forcing you to run to the 24 hour Walmart when your cat knocks your monitor off your desk on Deadline Eve. I can imagine a world where I’d have one or two other monitors for menus or Netflix as needed, but for now I just have the big one. Regarding types of LED monitors, TN (twisted nematic) offers less optimal viewing angles as compared to IPS (in-plane switching), which may matter if your monitor is sufficiently big. If you’re made of money, buy a 40” retina display. While you’re at it, why don’t you get a $1500 Optimus Popularis keyboard too, moneybags?

Peripherals

The foregoing has explored what we put inside our machines to optimize them for animating the complicated scenes that medical or scientific subjects generally require. However, choosing the right tools to interface with the machine is also important. Brand isn’t particularly important for most of them, but I find that having some instance of these items makes life easier.

What Do You Mean, A Cintiq AND an Intuos Tablet?

You heard me. I haven’t used a mouse in 20 years except when my tablet needed replacing. The fine motor skills used with the tablet allow speedier and more coordinated cursor movement, which can be important when interfacing with a larger monitor. Every scientific animation requires a storyboard, and I use the Cintiq when drawing them to get more inspired, gestural results. If you already have the retina display and fancy keyboard made of tiny monitors, why not upgrade to the 27” 4K Cintiq while you’re at it? And maybe throw in the $12,000 ErgoQuest Zero Gravity Workstation Ultimate, because you don’t do anything halfway.

I’m Kidding about Zero Gravity Chairs. You Need Exercise.

As medical animators, we are steeped in the sciences surrounding healthcare, so I have no doubt that readers of this article will be aware that daily exercise, in particular frequent walking, are among the healthiest things we can do for ourselves and that sitting all day is basically the new smoking. As long as we’re talking about the ideal workspace, one extravagance I genuinely suggest is the treadmill desk. I’ve been using one from Lifespan Fitness for ten years, and I’ll never go back to sitting while working. In addition to avoiding some of the aches that come with sitting in a chair all day, the treadmill desk actually loosens the muscles and can make back pain go away. At first I was worried that I wouldn’t have any precision with my tablet, but I discovered that walking at a leisurely 1.5 miles per hour doesn’t disturb hand movement nearly as badly as I expected. I’ve drawn entire storyboards forgetting that it was on, only to look down and discover I’d covered half a dozen miles.

Caveat: they’re not for everyone. I have encountered a select few cases where people have tried them out and just couldn’t fit them into their work style. Also, get one with power height adjustment. It may sound frivolous, but tweaking the height manually requires an unrealistic amount of upper body strength and number of arms.

A Mouse Infestation

There’s a LOT of mouse options. I don’t use any. However I have heard of people using mice designed with 3D in mind, but having tried it I found that I only needed the intuos tablet to navigate. Many power users go with macro keyboards as well, but call me an interface minimalist. Who has two thumbs and one keyboard? This guy. Who has two thumbs and lots of friends with other ideas? Mike Hickman. I don’t get out much.

Microphone

It's optional, but if possible, get a quality USB mic. They are dirt cheap and make your scratch voice tracks noticeably nicer. Plus, if you’re like present day me, you can dial down the gain and set up your homemade plywood-and-foam sound booth and record VOs that sound like they were made in a sound studio. Or, if you’re like grad school me, use a long USB cable and read your scripts in your closet to mask the sound of sirens, gunfire, and dogs barking. Quality scratch tracks add to the overall professionalism of the work, which smooths the review process with medical animation clients.

Uninterruptable Power Supply (UPS)

It would be a shame to lose your work because of a sudden power outage. Most UPSs only have enough juice for five or ten minutes of work, which is just enough time to save your current project, close all your internet windows, start to close your word files and realize you never saved them, then individually save each of them as quickly as you can, then hit power off, then wait for Windows to finish its update before powering down.

If you’re going to get a UPS, I recommend getting a higher-capacity model. They’re generally only $20 or so more expensive, and they’re all available for under $200. Worth every penny. If you intend to be a power user, Mike Hickman recommends getting one with a replaceable battery, as they’re prone to failure after 2 or 3 years. I just bought whatever was cheapest but could handle my machine, and it’s done just fine so far.

At the very least, get a quality surge protector. Often when power flickers or comes back on, the electrical load can spike to levels damaging to electronics. Get it rated for the maximum joules possible. This is another Mike Hickman suggestion, but as a person living in a state that observes its own awareness week for severe weather, I stand by it.

A Good Rig Will Last

Spending a little extra now on the right parts will pay off in the long-run in the form of avoiding lost cumulative hours waiting for interfaces to update, preview frames to appear, caches to be calculated, changes we’ve made to be incorporated into our scenes and composites. Further, investing in high quality parts in the present offsets their obsolescence in the future.

Make Future You happy. Eat Ramen for a few months if you have to, maybe sell some blood or something to pay for it. You won’t regret it.

Article by: Nancy R. Gough, PhD, Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics

As a professional scientific communicator, I know firsthand how difficult it is to convey complex topics to audiences with diverse backgrounds. Additionally, the types of science that I typically read and highlight span multiple scales, from organismal to molecular, and often represent highly dynamic biological processes. So, even though a picture is worth a thousand words, often a movie or animation is far more effective. This principle applies to the biomedical industry.

The Power of Pharmaceutical Animation

Even medications with fairly simple mechanisms of action must navigate from the site of administration (often the gastrointestinal tract) into the correct cells to reach the molecular target. An effective scientific animation that can properly convey the concepts at the various scales is an incredibly valuable tool at all stages of pharmaceutical development and marketing.

The Many Uses of Pharmaceutical Animation

A masterful animation that distills the complex concepts accurately and provides engaging graphics and imagery has incredible power and utility:

• At the early stages, such an animation can help convince venture capitalists or other investors to fund in a new therapeutic concept.
• As the candidate medication reaches Phase II clinical trials, a clear and accurate pharmaceutical animation can help recruit collaborators, physicians, and patients to participate in the clinical trials.
• Once the medication has received approval, pharmaceutical representatives, conference exhibits, and the company website can use the animation in marketing materials to educate and inform the clinicians who will prescribe the medication.
• Finally, doctors can use the pharmaceutical animation with their patients to help them understand how the new medication works and provide insight into the risks and limitations that may accompany using the new medicine.

Animations are also excellent resources for the press. When researching a topic, I often visit pharmaceutical or biotechnology company websites to look for reference materials. An effective biomedical animation provides critical insight that helps me write my story.

Microverse Studios: Pharmaceutical Animation Experts

With their award-winning team of scientific and medical animators and illustrators, Microverse Studios has the expertise in scientific and medical animation and video production to take your idea and create a professional video that is ready for deployment on multiple platforms.

Image source: Midjourney

The verdict is in: People prefer video to text, and for good reason. The majority of us are visual learners, and 90% of the information transmitted to our brains is graphic in nature. We process pictures 60,000 times faster than text, and not only do we understand concepts quicker when presented visually, we retain their lessons by more than 85%. Done, sold. Video content is king, so it’s a given that smart companies choose animation to tell their complex scientific stories. But once you have this magic content in hand, how do you make sure people see it?

1. Post It to Make the Most of It

There’s no doubt your animation should be posted through all official company channels, but we love the idea of leadership encouraging employees and partners to share it on their personal accounts. A stellar Mechanism of Action or Medical Device animation is the perfect way for people to show their network what they’ve been working on, and allowing them to share on their preferred platforms in a way that feels natural will deliver broader reach and generate genuine excitement. Don’t forget, promoting your content through the human channels of your organization always yields the most authentic results.

2. Now Screening…

Like moths to flames, humans are unfailingly drawn to screens. Take advantage of this by displaying your animation on the many screens throughout the office and beyond. From video walls behind your CEO’s conference keynote or investor talk to monitors in lobbies and meeting rooms to employees’ virtual video backgrounds on Zoom. If there’s a screen for people to see, make sure that animation is playing. People are naturally curious, so the more visibility your animation is given, the more opportunities you’ll encounter to talk about your groundbreaking science.

3. Embrace the QR Code

Quick Response (QR) codes are the fastest path from print to screen, and with a smartphone in every pocket, your animation can be playing in a matter of seconds. Generate a custom QR Code using a variety of providers, both free and paid, and include your scan code on marketing collateral, patient education pieces, product packaging, posters, business cards, you name it. Think of your scientific animation as the superhero who swoops in to demonstrate your value to partners, and your QR code as the Bat-Signal in the sky.

4. Enter the Livestream

Nothing beats the engagement of livestreaming. It’s like going live on TV direct to your audience, only you get to interact with them, answer questions, react to their comments, forging connections no other medium can deliver. Using your scientific animation as the centerpiece of your livestream is an aces way to get comfortable with the medium while touting the prowess of your product. Leaders from every department can leverage the animation’s powerful storytelling to communicate their value, pausing to expound on a topic, and answering questions afterwards for a global audience. Every major social media platform offers a free livestreaming service, so set your date, invite your network, and put your animation to work.

5. Don’t Forget the IRL

With all the incredible tech connecting us virtually, it’s sometimes easy to forget good old-fashioned in-person meetings. Your scientific animation remains the single most effective visual aid you can use at investor presentations, sales pitches, and other mission-critical events. Every pitch and presentation has its own unique angle, so don’t be afraid to slice the animation to fit your narrative like a glove. You’ve invested a lot to produce a world-class visual asset, and most animation studios worth their salt will be happy to produce clips and alternate
edits for free. As a client-centered agency, we certainly do.

Sources:
https://www.shiftelearning.com/blog/bid/350326/studies-confirm-the-power-of-visuals-in-elearning
https://www.wyzowl.com/video-marketing-statistics/
https://invideo.io/blog/video-marketing-statistics/

When creating video content for your medical device, it needs to do more than look appealing on screen. A presentation for a new therapy or device should be clear, concise, and engaging. Take a step in a new medical device marketing direction by learning why your company needs medical animation.

Your Presentation Time Is Limited

A video needs to grab the viewers’ attention in the first 15 seconds. Every video needs to do more than list facts; it needs to engage the viewer and teach them about your device.

Show, Don’t Tell

Film makes complex topics easier to understand. A medical device video can establish a problem that needs solving, show how conventional tools fall short, and show how your device is the hero. After watching the video, the viewer should understand the solution your device offers and the basics of how it works.

The Audience Builds Their Knowledge From Your Videos

Medical device animation sets itself apart from other video types. It can give the viewer a walkthrough of how your device works, even showing what the device does and how it interacts with tissue with greater clarity than live video. With animation, it is simple to show action that takes place inside the device and inside the body, depicting things that cannot be filmed live. Animation also allows us to control the style of the imagery and to avoid showing anything that could provoke a visceral reaction from the viewer. We can make a surgery video beautiful instead of off-putting. Medical device animation can also make a surgical video engaging for the audience.

If there’s any form of media that’s educational, engaging, and beautiful, it’s animation. Animation’s not only limited to the patient; it’s a marketing tool that appeals to doctors, investors, and other healthcare professionals as well.

If you need to know how to use medical device animation in pharmaceutical marketing, you’ll find all your answers here. Microverse Studios offers compelling storytelling abilities that reshape how viewers watch videos. Our work includes finding the right pacing, visual treatment, and music to set the perfect tone for your brand and selecting the right visuals for your device’s video. Our team can create strong, rich content that helps explain your story to the viewers.

Often, when producing scientific animation that contains cellular events, we have to show cells bursting or otherwise spilling their contents into the surrounding space. Cinema4D 2023 offers some amazing new tools for built-in, plugin free volumetric gaseous simulations, but this isn't available for cloud rendering yet. While we wait, here's a tutorial to get very similar effects using Cinema 4D's own built-in dynamics, cloth effects, and combinations of volume builders to get Redshift to render cell contents properly diffusing after cell lysis.

The motion molecules make when they interact is important to the character of a medical animation, whether it's Mechanism of Action or something else. In this Cinema 4D tutorial, we show how to make the momentum of the impact force of a ligand binding to a receptor deform the cell surface so that it has a brief sink-and-bob effect.

This tutorial shows how to create smooth bilayer motion in Cinema4D when producing medical animation.

In medical animation, we often show cells and other structures bursting and releasing their contents into the surrounding area. Simulating these effects has traditionally been extremely time consuming and has required plugins that can complicate the process. Cinema 4D version 2023 now includes a realtime fire simulator that does a fantastic job, but it's not yet compatible with cloud rendering systems such as the one we use. Embergen, by JangaFx, simulates volumes in realtime, but you have to bake them to a .vdb stack to make them usable in Cinema 4D and they won't interact with the scene, pushing other elements around. Xparticles is great, but the simulation process is agonizingly slow.

Not only that, but often medical animation students are limited to what software they can install in their department, so having a solution that works in every version of Cinema 4D after version 20 without any plugins is a must.

This tutorial demonstrates how to use a cloner, some spheres, and volume generators to get excellent goopy cell contents effects with minimal effort and no extra software.

One topic that often comes up in medical animation or scientific animation projects is viral, bacterial, or parasitic replication within cells. This tutorial shows how to pack a red blood cell with malaria parasites (it could be any other creature of course), and have them burst out of it and get swept away into the blood flow. No need to bake particles, no special plugins, just good old-fashioned Mograph and dynamics.