While a 2D image is a non-animated image, motion can be created with this type of content easily by rotating the image on the screen, changing the location in the raster, or resizing. A DMX-controlled media server allows the programmer to easily manipulate all of these attributes from a lighting console, and also to store those changes in lighting cues. However, for media servers not being triggered by a lighting console, all of these attributes have to be rendered into a video clip from within a digital video editing software application. Motion Graphics are images that are animated using keyframes. They can be digitally created or captured using a camera and then imported into a non-linear editing (NLE) program. Since NLE software is designed to work with file-based media, analog and digital tape, stereoscopic 3D material and film — all in the same timeline and workflow — a composited video can be rendered and exported much more easily than the old-fashioned method of cutting and splicing tape.
—Vickie Claiborne, from “Focus on Fundamentals,” PLSN, June 2012
