Usefulness of animations is not confined to entertainment, industrial and marketing purposes. Animations have made inroads into several other areas including health and medicine.

Medical animations serve different purposes like educational or demonstrational under different applications to suit pharmaceutical, hospital and institutional requirements. Medical Animators have to be especially skillful since they have to perform diverse and complex functions such as –

• Show the actions of drugs on our blood stream and body.

• Create interactive interior and exterior models of the human body under macro and microscopic scales for interaction by students.

• Depict patient data in the form of meaningful, easy to understand 3D images.

• Create instructions for students using friendly type graphics.

• Show the impact of given surgical techniques.

• Depict the differences in the working of presently available equipment and proposed equipment.

Depiction of human body statistics and data could be portrayed more accurately using sensors with 3D graphics than with conventional video imaging methods, which are now being replaced.

For medical graphical interpretations to be informative and highly accurate, a good knowledge of medicine is absolutely necessary in addition to knowledge of animation techniques.

Animations for conventional purposes do not require measurements and proportions to a very high degree of accuracy since the focus is only on an attractive animating image. However, in medicine, to portray for example cell splitting / multiplication, bacteria formation or a cross section of the skin with its micro thin multiple layers and pores visible only through a microscope, then everything depends on portraying the relevant components in their correct proportions than on a mere attractive animating image.

A medical animator is comparable to a surgeon without a scalpel, gloves and a mask; but with a mind of a surgeon in portraying graphically in precise detail and accuracy what is only important; disregarding the other irrelevant material in the surroundings. It is no doubt one of the most challenging jobs connected with animations, and yet one of the most rewarding too if you have the required aptitude and skills.