Finding an efficient way to assess, harness, and manage electric power is essential when dealing with the most common natural issues in oil fields. From bad weather and torrential storms, to overloaded grids and overall electrical disturbances, there’s a need for supplemental power during these power fluctuations and disruptions.
Power Sentry has the solution for this challenge with its patented Electrical Ride-Through (ERT) technology, providing constant electrical strength during these annoying interruptions. Here’s how we helped them bring their system to life.

For this specific project, 3D animation was the obvious choice over live-action video. Why? It allows for:

• Continued maintenance of the VSD’s variable speed drivers. Disrupting a thorough preventive maintenance program can end badly and be extremely cost-prohibitive for the client. We decided to avoid this completely.
• Saved effort and expenses. Instead of wasting time to travel and get the right shot at the right time, the customer saves money and we save effort. Plus, who knows how to summon an electrical storm on demand?
• Reduced workforce exposure to travel to the field. We can reduce the amount of people exposed to the field during harsh conditions.
• Extend life of the equipment. With less pressure to get the shot of the system in action in real-time, we can help sustain the life of the equipment for the customer.

Our vision for this 3D explainer video example stemmed from the drive to be thorough, detail-oriented and straightforward. The explanation of how Power Sentry’s system works needed to feel as legitimate as possible to showcase just how useful ERT can be.

Which means we needed to create our own perfect storm. And we did just that.

We curated a 3D animation that sets a gorgeous scene: It’s a beautiful day. The wind is blowing and the sun is shining. Soon enough, the dark clouds begin to roll in and the lightning strikes. Now we’re looking at a dark stormy environment that seems overwhelming, but it’s no match for Power Sentry’s ERT.

We decided to make the storyboard with viewport captures, a powerful feature that we use to create 3D models. This isn’t our typical process, but it gave our extremely literal clients a better idea of how the final composition will look. This made the most sense to us since the camera perspective and equipment would look the same here as it would in the final reader.

To bring the power of the solution to life, we used Video Copilot’s saber effect to highlight green lines. This paints a visual of what the system is doing when it’s hard at work.

We used many layers to create the final frame; each frame has different render passes that are composited together.

The storm consisted of lightning and cloud stock footage transformed and blended with our 3D renders. We used After Effects to create the camera shake, desaturated storm colors and motion blur. And we used sound effects to make the storm feel real and bring the entire video together.

The end result? A thorough visual explanation of how to solve electrical inefficiencies. With this material, Power Sentry can change the way people look at power generation and offer an environmentally-friendly option that can change the world.