Inside a 2D Animation Studio: How We Build Clarity Frame by Frame

Ever wondered what actually happens inside an animation studio between "yes, we'd love to work with you" and "here's your finished video"?

Spoiler: it's not all jazzy music and people drawing cute characters while sipping artisan coffee.

(Okay, there's some of that. But mostly it's obsessing over whether a single frame communicates the right thing.)

At Leon! Animations, we've spent years refining how our 2D animation studio turns complicated messages into 60 seconds of perfect clarity. And since we're big believers in simplicity, we thought we'd pull back the curtain and show you exactly how we do it.

No smoke, no mirrors. Just the messy, creative, occasionally chaotic process that builds understanding frame by frame.

Step 1 - Our Animation Company's Process: The Script Comes First

Everything starts with words.

Before a single pixel gets pushed or character gets sketched, we nail down the script. This is non-negotiable. Once it's signed off, the four-week timeline begins, and there's no going back without derailing everything.

Why so strict? Because clients will debate individual words until the heat death of the universe if you let them. (We say this with love. We get it. Words matter.)

But here's the thing: a great animation can't save a rubbish script. So we lock this down first.

Our animation company works mostly with charities, NGOs, and healthcare organisations. People dealing with genuinely complex stuff. Mental health policies. Migration stories. Medical procedures. These aren't simple topics, which is exactly why the script needs to be ruthlessly simple.

We cut, polish, and trim until every sentence earns its place. No fluff. No jargon. Just clarity.

Step 2 - How Our 2D Animation Studio Builds Visual Ideas: Mood Boards

Right, script's done. Now the visual brainstorming begins.

This is where our 2D animation company process gets properly hands-on. We break the script down line by line onto a digital mood board using Milanote, a brilliant visual workspace tool from Australia that lets us pin images, notes, and ideas onto an infinite canvas. Honestly, we're a bit obsessed with it. It's transformed how we collaborate with clients and organise our creative chaos.

Around each line of the script, we throw up dozens of visual ideas: stock images from Google, stills from past projects, concept art, random screenshots. Anything that might spark the right direction. It's controlled chaos, but Milanote keeps it manageable.

Then we jump on a video call (Zoom, Teams, whatever works) with the client and Leo, our founder, to pick the strongest images together. This collaborative bit is crucial because it means we're not disappearing into a creative cave for three weeks only to emerge with something the client hates.

Instead, we're building the visual language together in real-time. Honestly, just watch the video below 😉

For our work with the UN Network on Migration on their "Saving Migrants' Lives" campaign, this mood board stage was critical. The project addresses a silent humanitarian crisis: since 2014, nearly 70,000 migrants have died or gone missing along migration routes. The UN Secretary General developed actionable recommendations to prevent these tragedies, and our job was to communicate these life-saving measures clearly and respectfully. The client could point at an image and say "more like this" or "definitely not that," helping us find the right balance between gravity and accessibility.

Once we've got the visual direction locked, our illustration team uses those selected images as a compass for creating cohesive, bespoke illustrations that fit the client's branding/style.

See example Mood Board and Final Video.  

Step 3 - Animation Studio Workflow: Testing Timing Before We Commit

Here's where our animation studio does something a bit unusual.

Before our illustrators spend hours creating polished scenes, we need to know if the timing actually works. An illustration might look perfect on paper, but if the corresponding voiceover line only takes one second to say, does that image have enough time to register? Or does everything feel rushed and off?

We create a rough slideshow where each selected mood board image plays in sync with an AI-generated voiceover reading the script. This is our timing reality check.

If this scrappy test works (using mixed stock images and robot voices), then we know the pacing feels right. We know the final animation (with illustrated scenes, a human voiceover, and music) will absolutely sing.

If something feels rushed or drags? We catch it now, before wasting time illustrating scenes that won't work at the actual speed of human speech.

This is how our animated explainer video studio avoids expensive mistakes. Test early, test rough, respect real-time, save everyone's sanity.

Step 4 - Custom Animation Service: Creating Your Brand's Unique Style

Now our illustration team takes those tested ideas and refines them into polished, brand-aligned artwork.

If the client has brand guidelines, brilliant. We follow them. If they just have a logo and a vague sense of "we like blue"? Also brilliant. We work with whatever they've got.

Here's the thing: we're not just animators. We're graphic designers and branders who go out of our way to ensure the visuals blend seamlessly with each client's identity rather than imposing our own house style on everything.

Compare the illustration style we created for Trust for London versus IOM versus British Heart Foundation versus the Guy's & St Thomas' Hospital. They look completely different because each one reflects that client's unique branding and the specific needs of their project.

This flexibility matters enormously for nonprofits and charities. Your animation should feel like it belongs to you, not like it came from a studio template.

Step 5 - Professional Voiceover Selection: Finding The Right Voice

We send clients 10-20 professional voiceover artist samples, but here's the crucial bit: we don't just send generic showreels. We have each artist record a section of the actual script.

This matters more than people think. We've tried skipping this step and just letting clients pick from showreels, but more often than not, the VO who seemed like the perfect choice didn't sound right when they actually read our script.

A voiceover artist might have a brilliant showreel, but do they suit your specific message? The only way to know is to hear them read your words.

One of favourite voiceover artists to work with, Josef-Israel, was nominated for a One Voice Award for narrating our mental health animation for IOM. The right voice doesn't just read words. It carries emotion, builds trust, and makes people actually listen.

Step 6 - 2D Animation Production: Where The Magic Happens

Our animation team works in Adobe After Effects, bringing those illustrated scenes to life with smooth motion and seamless transitions.

After Effects remains the industry standard despite plenty of competition trying to dethrone it. It just works.

We specialise in character animation because so many of our clients (charities, hospitals, NGOs) work with people-focused causes. Human stories need human characters, and 2D handles this beautifully.

Here's something interesting: 3D can do character animation brilliantly if you've got a million-dollar budget. But when it comes to explaining complex ideas clearly, 2D has a superpower: visual simplicity cuts through confusion.

Ever noticed how kids' shows like Paw Patrol or Bing use fancy 3D animation for action and storytelling, but switch to simple 2D whenever they need to explain something difficult? Mission briefings, problem summaries, concept explanations. All 2D. That's not an accident. Flat, simplified graphics let the information breathe. Your brain focuses on the idea, not the visual complexity.

For charities explaining migration policy or hospitals breaking down medical procedures, clarity beats spectacle every time. 2D keeps the focus exactly where it needs to be: on understanding the message.

This is the bit that takes the longest and requires the most technical skill. Every frame matters. Every transition needs to support the story, not distract from it.

Frame by frame, we're building clarity.

Step 7 - Explainer Video Production: Sound Mixing Makes The Difference

Clients choose from curated stock music options. We spend hours trawling through Envato Elements to find tracks that match the tone. Then, once animation, voiceover, and music are ready, we send everything to a professional sound mixer.

This step is criminally underrated but makes a huge difference. Bad audio mixing is like watching a film where the dialogue is too quiet and the music is too loud. It's exhausting and distracting.

Good sound mixing? You don't even notice it. Everything just feels balanced and right.

Why Our Animated Video Production Service Works for Charities and NGOs

Our animated video production service isn't about churning out cookie-cutter content. It's about taking complicated, important messages (refugee stories, healthcare innovations, climate science) and distilling them into something anyone can understand.

That's why our process is so collaborative. We're not mind readers, but we've made enough animations for enough people to know that clarity doesn't happen by accident.

It happens frame by frame, choice by choice, conversation by conversation.

When Guy & St Thomas' NHS Trust needed to explain their MyChart app, our multi-video campaign helped register 300,000+ users in the first six months. That didn't happen because we made something flashy. It happened because we made something clear.

When the UN Migration agency needed to hit their 2,000 sign-up target for iDiaspora, our animation helped them surpass it. Again: clarity over spectacle.

What Our Animation Production Company Does Best

The Royal Society's climate change video has racked up 500,000+ YouTube views and counting.

Not because we used cutting-edge technology or revolutionary techniques, but because we made complex climate science feel accessible, human, and simple.

That's what our animation production company does best. We subtract complications and multiply simplicity.

Want to know more about the humans behind all this? Meet Leon! and the team keeping this whole operation running from rural Spain.

If your message matters enough to share, it matters enough to be understood. Ready to turn complexity into clarity? Get in touch