3D Motion Graphics Deep Dive 07 - Inspiring People & Events
Fill your socials with these awesome peeps!
We have reached the part of the deep dive where we talk about the people and places that will actually move the needle for you.
If you have made the decision to make a move into motion graphics, you cannot half ass it. Go in with your entire ass and immerse yourself in this world. The best first step in that process is to follow the people who are doing the work at the highest level. As I have mentioned before, craft your social media experience around what you want to learn. Create a dedicated account or just start following the right people on your existing one. What ends up happening is the algorithm sees what you are doing and feeds you more of it. More artists, more events, more software announcements. It is the simplest possible way to get plugged into an industry.
I also highly recommend attending events. Even just sitting in on talks and listening to the way people discuss their work and the industry is valuable. You will pick up the language, the references, the names that keep coming up. That alone puts you ahead of most people trying to break in.
Below are my go-tos. This is not an exhaustive list, it is a starting point. If there are people I missed, please let me know. I would love to keep adding to this.
Artists to Follow
Peter Tarka
London-based art director and 3D illustrator whose work you have almost certainly seen without knowing it. Apple, Nike, Google, BMW, Adobe, Airbnb. His style is unmistakable: bold geometry, vibrant color, immaculate composition. Worth studying both the work and the positioning.
EJ Hassenfratz (Eyedesyn)
If you are coming from a 3D background and want to get into motion graphics, EJ is probably the most practical follow on this list. He is a Creative Director at School of Motion and has been making Cinema 4D and After Effects tutorials for over a decade. His YouTube channel alone has over 150 tutorials. He has a gift for making complicated things feel approachable, which is a rare skill. Start there and work backwards.
Jonathan Winbush
Multi-award-winning motion graphics artist with credits spanning Marvel, DC, Warner Bros, Netflix, and Hasbro. Iron Man, Transformers, and Lego Batman 2 are on his resume. These days he is one of the leading voices on bringing real-time technology, specifically Unreal Engine 5, into motion design workflows. His YouTube channel is free, genuinely useful, and updated constantly. He is also one of the more accessible people in the industry, which counts for a lot.
PJ Richardson
Co-founder and ECD of LAUNDRY, one of the most respected motion design studios working today. PJ has built a career doing brand work for Samsung, Microsoft, Meta, Instagram, Snap, and more. But what makes him worth following is not just the work. It is the way he thinks about creativity, craft, and the business of running a studio. He is refreshingly honest about all of it. Also, he designed the opening titles for OFFF Barcelona 2026, which is about as much of a flex as this industry has.
Jayson Whitmore
Co-founder of We Are Royale and now ECD at LAUNDRY. His credits span Nike, Apple, Google, Ikea, Meta, Amazon, Riot Games, and The Sphere in Las Vegas. He thinks deeply about what makes a studio culture actually work and is generous about sharing that thinking. A good one to follow if you care about the long game.
Emonee LaRussa
Two-time Emmy Award-winning motion graphics artist with 760K Instagram followers and a client list that includes Lil Nas X, Kanye West, FKA Twigs, John Legend, and Saturday Night Live. Her style is vibrant, character-driven, and unmistakably hers. But what really sets her apart is that she uses her platform to bring others up with her. She founded JumpStart Designers, a nonprofit that gets computers and design education into the hands of kids in underserved communities. She is proof that you can have a singular artistic voice, a thriving career, and still make room to change who gets access to this industry.
Instagram (760K followers) YouTube Website
Jess Hewitt (Virtually Visual)
Creative Director, YouTuber, and Cinema 4D and Houdini artist who has made a genuine name for herself not just through the quality of her work but through the way she teaches it. She does tutorials for Maxon, shares free project files with her audience, and approaches education like someone who actually remembers what it felt like not to know this stuff. Her content is about enabling people to make great things, not just showcasing that she can. The motion graphics space needs more of that energy, and she brings it consistently.
Helena Papageorgiou
Animator, art director, and motion designer whose work spans music videos, live visuals, and augmented reality experiences. Helena is one of the more interesting artists on this list because her practice genuinely crosses disciplines: 2D, 3D, collage, projection, AR. She was part of the Camp Mograph Australia speaker lineup, which tells you the kind of company she keeps. If you want to see what motion design looks like when it pushes into more experimental, narrative-driven territory, her work is worth studying.
Connor Henkle
A great example of what happens when you niche down hard and own it. Connor specializes in stadium and sports venue motion graphics packages, building animated visual systems for sports teams and events. He is self-taught, built his entire career from a laptop and YouTube, and has been incredibly open about how he did it. If you are interested in the sports and live events space within motion graphics, he is your guy.
People Shaping the Industry
Joey Korenman — School of Motion
Joey founded School of Motion in 2013 and turned it into the most recognized motion design education platform in the world. Over 400,000 YouTube subscribers, 30-plus courses, and a community that has helped thousands of artists build real careers. He also runs the Motion Mondays newsletter and is one of the clearest thinkers in the space about where motion design is headed. Follow him if you want to understand the industry, not just the tools.
School of Motion YouTube LinkedIn
Chris Schmidt (Rocket Lasso)
If Cinema 4D had a hall of fame, Chris Schmidt would be in it. He got his start as one half of the early Greyscalegorilla team, where he built a reputation for solving problems in C4D in ways nobody else had thought of. His tutorials became instant classics. Artists learned their way around Cinema 4D because of him before there were a dozen other options to choose from. These days he runs Rocket Lasso, his own company built around plugins, in-depth tutorials, and a two-hour weekly live Q&A show where he answers motion graphics and Cinema 4D questions in real time. He also developed a suite of plugins including Ricochet, Mesh To Spline, and Slicer that a lot of serious C4D artists have in their workflows. And he runs Half Rez, a Chicago-based community event for the Midwest motion design scene. If you want to go deep on Cinema 4D, Chris is one of the most reliable people to learn from in the space.
Motionographer
Not a person, but treat it like one. Motionographer has been the editorial standard for motion design since 2006. Co-founded by Justin Cone, it is where the industry goes to see curated, high-quality work with real context behind it. If you want to develop your eye fast, spend time here. The work they feature is not random. It is specifically the kind of work that matters.
Events Worth Attending
Camp Mograph
This one is genuinely special. Camp Mograph is not a conference. It is a multi-day creative retreat held in an outdoor location, and the whole point is to get artists off their screens and into actual conversations with each other. Workshops, fireside talks, and the kind of networking that actually feels like connecting with people rather than collecting business cards. Sponsored by Maxon and Greyscalegorilla. If you can only do one event, make it this one. It is fully all-inclusive, which means everything from meals to the open bar is covered. Yes, there is an open bar. Yes, that matters.
OFFF Barcelona
OFFF has been running for over 25 years and is the closest thing this industry has to a flagship festival. Three days in Barcelona every spring with talks, workshops, masterclasses, and a design market that brings together creative directors, designers, motion artists, and studios from all over the world. The lineups are consistently excellent. PJ Richardson designed the opening titles for the 2026 edition, which tells you everything about the caliber of people involved. Bonus: Barcelona. You are welcome.
NAB Show + Mograph Meetup
NAB is the big broadcast and media technology conference held every spring in Las Vegas. For motion designers, the reason to go is the Mograph Meetup that Joey Korenman and School of Motion host alongside it. It is a free event at a bar full of motion designers, and it is one of the few places where you can meet industry people in a setting that feels nothing like an industry event. The main floor has plenty of software demos and announcements worth seeing too, but the meetup is the real draw.
Half Rez
Speaking of events that don’t feel like industry events, Half Rez is Chris Schmidt’s Chicago-based gathering for the Midwest motion design community. It is smaller and more intimate than the big conferences, which is exactly the point. If you are in the Midwest or can get to Chicago, it is worth putting on your radar. The vibe is collaborative, the conversations are real, and the people who show up are genuinely passionate about the craft.
SIGGRAPH
The most technically focused event on this list. SIGGRAPH draws researchers, engineers, and artists working at the absolute cutting edge of computer graphics and interactive techniques. If you want to understand where the technology is heading before it reaches the tools you use every day, this is where you go. It skews more technical than creative, but that is kind of the point.
PIXEL X PIXEL
A new contender has entered the arena of Motion Graphics events! Pixel × Pixel is an event in Japan bringing together top 3D and motion design artists for a day of presentations and creative exchange. The 2025 edition featured EJ Hassenfratz, Jonathan Winbush, and Japanese motion designer Koji Aramaki, with a focus on real-time workflows, Cinema 4D, and Unreal Engine. They are rolling out more events and this is one to keep your eye on.
Communities Worth Joining
Beyond the events, there are a few ongoing communities worth joining. School of Motion has an active Discord and community forums. Motionographer’s comment sections are still some of the most substantive conversations in the space. And of course, The 3D Artist Community (shameless plug, obviously) is where a lot of the conversations from these deep dives continue. If you are a 3D artist navigating the move into motion graphics or any adjacent field, that is the room to be in.
Get out of your comfort zone and get into the rooms with these people, and the industry starts to feel a lot less like something you are trying to break into and a lot more like something you are already a part of.
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Hello! Michael Tanzillo here. I am the Head of Technical Artists with the Substance 3D team at Adobe. Previously, I was a Senior Artist on animated films at Blue Sky Studios/Disney with credits including three Ice Age movies, two Rios, Peanuts, Ferdinand, Spies in Disguise, and Epic.
In addition to his work as an artist, I am the Co-Author of the book Lighting for Animation: The Visual Art of Storytelling and the Co-Founder of The Academy of Animated Art, an online school that has helped hundreds of artists around the world begin careers in Animation, Visual Effects, and Digital Imaging. I also created The 3D Artist Community on Skool and this newsletter.
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Amazing list and can’t believe I am on it! Great company to be around! Thanks for introducing me to new artists and really appreciate you shouting out our PxP conference! Definitely a labor of love! Hope you see you at one soon, Michael!!?