motion-assets

An animation is only as good as what is in it. Three shapes and a font is a template no matter how well it is eased.

The rule that governs this whole skill: nothing enters the edit at the color, scale, or texture it arrived in. Every asset gets conformed. An un-conformed stock asset is the fastest way to make a frame read as assembled rather than designed.

1. Sample the palette before sourcing anything

Do this first. Every later decision depends on it.

1. Pull 3–5 stills from the A-roll (ffmpeg -ss <t> -i in.mp4 -frames:v 1 out.png).
2. Find the strongest non-skin, non-neutral hue — practical light, wall wash, jacket, product, set dressing.
3. That hue is the accent. Build ground / surface / accent from it per motion-design.
4. Write 04-design/tokens.css and palette.json. Everything downstream reads these files.

If there is no footage (pure motion piece), take the palette from the brand kit, or from the single strongest reference image — still sampled, never invented.

2. Collect references before generating anything