Hybrid animatics.
Drawn first. AI second.
When a 2D board won't sell the work and a full 3D pre-vis won't fit the schedule. Hand-drawn characters in Unreal Engine environments, finished with AI on the final pass. Five to ten days.
What hybrid means at our shop.
A hybrid animatic is three formats in one frame.
Hand-drawn character work for emotion. 3D environment for scale and accuracy. AI on the final pass for the polish that gets a client to lean forward.
A hybrid animatic sits between a 2D board (rough, fast, illustrative) and a full 3D pre-vis (slow, expensive, technical). It is the format agencies pick when the storyboard contains the words dolly, crane, or tracking shot more than twice.
The character work stays hand-drawn — same line our boards have used for the last twenty-eight years. The environment is built in Unreal Engine, scaled to the lens, lit for the time of day, walkable from any angle. The two are composited into a single frame. A final AI pass renders weather, crowds, atmospherics, and the texture work that takes a hand-drawn frame from rough to room-ready.
Used most often for high-stakes pitches, automotive, retail and architectural spots, and any commercial where the room itself is part of the story. Five to ten days from kickoff to final files. Same copyright foundation as our broadcast work — every project ships with a Human Oversight Verification Certificate signed against U.S. Copyright Registration PAu 4-297-548.
Hybrid animatics for the creative departments of the world's best agencies.
Founded 1997. Around 9,996 boards and animatics on the books. The founder personally drew the boards Steven Spielberg signed off on for the ET Super Bowl spot with Progressive Insurance in 1999. Featured on CNN. Project Odyssey AI Film Contest — Top 25.
Goodby Silverstein· TBWA\Chiat\Day· Wieden+Kennedy· BBDO· BBH· Ogilvy· Droga5· FCB· McCann· Leo Burnett· Adam & Eve/DDB· Lucky Generals· Publicis
Three reasons agencies pick hybrid over 2D, 3D, or photomatic.
Most animatic decisions come down to camera, schedule, and the room. Hybrid is built for the brief where all three matter at once.
Drawn for emotion.
Characters arrive on-model and on-brand because a human drew them. No AI hallucination on the face that has to land the joke. Same line, same hand, same fidelity our boards have shipped to Goodby and Wieden for two decades.
Built for accuracy.
Unreal Engine for the world the camera moves through. Real lens behavior. Real parallax. Real scale. Move the camera anywhere — the room holds. Useful when the spot has to sell a kitchen, a showroom, a stadium, or a factory floor.
Finished for the room.
AI on the final pass. Atmosphere, weather, light, crowd. The polish that takes an animatic from "this is what we're thinking" to "this is what we're doing." Copyright-registered workflow on the back end. Your legal team gets the documentation packet.
The five-step hybrid pipeline.
Day one to day ten. Same process every project. The pencil starts every frame.
A pencil. A frame. A human decision.
Brief intake, script analysis, shot-by-shot board. Characters drawn on paper or Wacom — the legal foundation and the creative one.
3D world in Unreal.
Environment built in Unreal Engine 5 to match the boards. Camera staged. Lens chosen. Lighting time-of-day locked.
Hand into the world.
Drawn characters composited into the 3D environment. Match-move on the camera. Shadows, ground contact, occlusion — all handled in plate.
AI on the final pass.
Atmosphere, weather, crowds, surface detail. Veo 3, Kling, ControlNet — anchored to the boards. Nothing generated outside the frame the human drew.
Copyright filed. Files out.
Human Oversight Verification Certificate signed. Documentation packet delivered. Master files in every format your client needs.
Selected hybrid animatics, 2024–2026.
Selected projects from the last two years. Categories anonymized for active campaigns. Full case studies available under NDA.
Loading hybrid animatics…
Twenty-eight years of billable work behind every frame.
Trusted by Fortune 500 brands, global agencies, and entertainment studios — for animatic, pre-vis, and editorial finishing work — since 1997.
From the people who hired us.
I personally worked with Animaticmedia/Storyboards.com over an intensive three day period for a pitch. They do great work and I will definitely use them again.
GOODBY SILVERSTEIN
Five animatic formats. One studio.
The wrong format costs more than the right one. Pick by camera, schedule, and the room you're presenting in.
| Format | Turnaround | Visual fidelity | Best for | Cost vs. live action |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Boardomatic | 5–7 days | Illustrated stills with motion | Concept validation, early-stage testing | ~5% |
| 2D Animatic | 5–10 days | Illustrated, fully animated | Story logic, dialogue, emotional beats | ~7% |
| Hybrid Animatic You are here | 5–10 days | Drawn characters · 3D world · AI finish | High-stakes pitches, complex camera, premium presentation | ~15% |
| 3D Animatic | 10–14 days | CGI photoreal | Complex camera, technical-spec spots | ~25% |
| AI Animatic | 5–10 days | AI photoreal end-to-end | Performance and look-testing, broadcast-ready output | ~10% |
All five formats start with hand-drawn boards. The finishing tools change. The author doesn't.
The questions buyers ask first. Answered straight.
Not in here? Email hello@animaticmedia.com. We answer in one business day.
What is a hybrid animatic? +
A hybrid animatic combines hand-drawn character work, 3D environments built in Unreal Engine, and an AI-finished final pass. It sits between a 2D board (rough, fast, illustrative) and a full 3D pre-vis (slow, expensive, technical). Agencies use hybrid animatics when the brief demands camera accuracy and premium presentation — usually for high-stakes pitches, automotive, retail spaces, and any spot where the room itself is part of the story.
When should I choose a hybrid animatic over a 2D animatic? +
When the camera matters. 2D animatics are right for emotion, dialogue, and sequence logic. Hybrid is right for shots that depend on parallax, scale, real lens behavior, or environments the client needs to walk through. If your storyboard has the words "dolly," "crane," or "tracking shot" more than twice, you want a hybrid.
How long does a hybrid animatic take to produce? +
Five to ten days from kickoff to final delivery. Day one and two: hand-drawn boards and character poses. Day three through six: 3D environment build in Unreal Engine. Day seven through nine: composite, motion, AI enhancement on the final pass. Day ten: copyright documentation and delivery files. Faster than full 3D pre-vis. More polished than a 2D board.
What's the difference between a hybrid animatic and an AI photomatic? +
An AI photomatic is photoreal end-to-end — every frame generated. A hybrid animatic keeps the human-drawn character on top of a 3D-built environment, with AI enhancement only on the final pass. Hybrid wins when characters need to look on-model and on-brand. Photomatic wins when you need photoreal product, crowd, or location renders. Both share the same copyright foundation.
Can I specify which scenes go hand-drawn versus 3D? +
Yes. The decision is made on the kickoff call, frame by frame. Default rule: characters and emotional beats stay hand-drawn. Environments, products, vehicles, and architecture move to 3D. Crowd shots, weather, and lens effects move to AI on the final pass. You can override any of it. The boards arrive marked so the room knows what it's looking at.
Is a hybrid animatic copyright-protected? +
Yes. Every project ships with documented human authorship — hand-drawn boards on file, art-direction notes, the studio's signed Human Oversight Verification Certificate. Animatic Media holds U.S. Copyright Registration PAu 4-297-548 for the underlying RenderLux workflow. The hybrid format inherits that foundation. Your legal team gets the documentation packet. Your finished animatic is yours to broadcast, license, or own.
Can a hybrid animatic become the finished commercial? +
Sometimes. About one in six hybrid animatics we deliver gets approved as the broadcast cut. Frames go from animatic-grade to broadcast-grade in a second pass — same boards, same 3D scaffolding, deeper AI render, sound design and grade. The animatic is no longer a stand-in. It's the master. Same workflow Animatic Media used on the AI Bytes commercial that received U.S. Copyright Registration PAu 4-297-548.
How does pricing work for hybrid animatics? +
Fixed-scope estimate within 48 hours of brief. Pricing scales with three inputs: spot length, number of unique 3D environments, and revision rounds. A standard :30 with two environments and one revision round runs in the range of a premium 2D animatic — roughly fifteen percent of full 3D pre-vis cost. Volume discounts apply on campaign packs. No hidden render fees, no per-revision charges inside the standard package.
Who does Animatic Media work with? +
Boards and animatics for the creative departments of Goodby Silverstein, TBWA\Chiat\Day, Wieden+Kennedy, BBDO, Ogilvy, Droga5, FCB, McCann, Leo Burnett, BBH, Adam & Eve/DDB, Lucky Generals, Publicis. Brand work for Amazon, Google, Nissan, Diageo, Sesame Street, Unilever, AB InBev, Kellogg's, Fidelity, Clorox. Founded 1997. Around 10,000 projects delivered.
Your pitch deserves
more than a 2D board.
Send the brief. We send a fixed-scope number in 48 hours. Hand-drawn frames in five days. Hybrid animatic in ten. Twenty-eight years of agency-side practice on the back end of every email.
Draw attention to your ideas. · Sometimes it takes more than a prompt.