Service
Medical Device Animation
Medical device animation shows what a device does once it is inside the body — how it deploys, seats, actuates and interacts with anatomy. It answers the question a photograph and a cutaway render cannot: what happens in the moment of use. Device animation carries an unusually wide internal audience. The same asset is typically reviewed by marketing, regulatory, clinical, legal and sometimes a surgeon advisory board, and used afterwards in sales calls, surgeon training, trade show loops, submission support and investor material. That breadth is why device projects run longer than their runtime suggests, and why the review structure is agreed at the start rather than discovered halfway through.
What a device project actually looks like
Device projects begin with the CAD and a question the animation has to answer — usually some version of "what does this do once it is inside the patient, that a photograph cannot show". The CAD is rebuilt rather than used directly: an engineering model carries tolerances, threads, fasteners and internal geometry that nobody will ever see on screen and that would make the render both slower and no more accurate.
The script then fixes the sequence: approach, deployment, seating, actuation, result. Alongside it, the review structure is agreed — who signs off, at which stage, and as one consolidated set of comments rather than four departmental passes. This is the step device teams most often skip, and skipping it is the commonest reason a short project becomes a long one.
Anatomy is built around the device to whatever fidelity the audience requires. A surgeon audience notices an implant seated wrongly instantly, and stops trusting everything else on screen; a sales audience needs the benefit legible at a glance. Those are different animations of the same device, and which one is being made is settled before modelling starts.
Can the animation be built from CAD?
Yes, and it usually should be. Working from your CAD guarantees the device on screen is the device you make, down to the geometry. CAD is rebuilt for animation rather than used directly — engineering models carry detail that is invisible on screen and expensive to render.
Can it be used in a regulatory submission?
Device animation is used to support 510(k) and PMA submissions and pre-submission meetings, where it communicates mechanism and operation more directly than written description. It supports the submission rather than replacing any required documentation, and the claims shown must match what the rest of the submission says.
How are review rounds handled with several stakeholders?
Consolidated. One collected set of comments per stage from all reviewers, rather than sequential rounds from each department, which is what turns a four-week project into a twelve-week one.
What does a device animation cost?
Projects start at $3,000 for a 30-second sequence built from CAD you already have, and $5,000 for a 60–90 second deployment or mechanism piece. Device work reviewed by several departments sits at $9,000 and above — the driver is the review structure and the complexity of the interaction with anatomy, not the length of the clip.
How long does a device animation take?
Four to six weeks from approved script to final file for a typical 60–90 second piece. Device projects are the ones most likely to run longer, and the reason is almost never the animation — it is the calendar. Agreeing who reviews what, and when, before the project starts is the single most effective thing a device team can do to protect the date.
Can one animation serve sales, training and the trade show?
Frequently yes, and it is worth deciding at the start. A booth loop has no audio and no beginning, because the viewer arrives at a random point and stands several metres away. A sales call version can be paused and talked over. Both can come from the same renders if the framing accounts for both at storyboard stage — retrofitting one from the other usually means re-animating.
What you supply
- CAD in any common format — STEP, IGES, native, or whatever your engineers use
- What the device does, and what the animation needs the viewer to understand
- The audience: surgeons, sales, regulatory reviewers, investors, a booth
- Any anatomical constraints — approach, placement, what it interacts with
- The list of internal reviewers, and who consolidates their comments
What you get
- A written script fixing the deployment sequence, for your correction
- A storyboard showing camera, anatomy and device interaction as stills
- The finished animation in the formats your teams actually use
- A silent, loopable cut for booth screens where the project calls for one
- The project files, so a device revision does not mean starting again