Stop motion

We started shooting the animation yesterday anf finished quite quickly. Ollie laied outside on the grass whlst Charlotte and Connie drew the animation down Ollies arm. I was taking the pictures and the only problem we had throught out the whole thing was that the camera ran out of battery halfway through. Ollie went up to get another but then the battery was working again, so we finished of shooting before it was too late. After we'd finished with taking the pictures we started to edit them on the computer and put them all together. We took a soundtrack from a differnt E4 ident on youtube and cut it to the right length and placed it over the animation. I think the whole thing went well overal and i'm pleased with the result.

Here is a copy of the animation on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmQXzFGCAkE&context=C260a1ADOEgsToPDskI5wMYSrv9iJPs2V6LMtedk

17/11/11

Today i started working in Ollie's group and i wrote up the production log, which can be found below. I also booked the camera for the group to use when we start shooting the animation.

Production Log

The Director – Ollie

Producer – Ollie

Camera person – Andy

Chief Animator – Charlotte

Chief Editor – Andy

We will shoot the images in any room with a table, so the only permission will we need is to use a room.

The camera will be above the animation and the animation will be done on the arm resting on the table.

The only props we will need are a pen, some cleaning wipes and some black card to put under the arm. Ollie will get the pen and cleaning wipes from a shop so we don’t need to make any of them. The black card will be used as the background and we can get that from college.

One problem that we may have is that it might be hard to remove the pen from the arm.

We will need to book a camera with a tripod and some lighting.

E4 Sting

This E4 sting was a entry for an E4 competition. I like this sting as it's very simple but at the same time it's quite effective. Each image that they show represents some sort of show/programme that they broadcast. The sounds that they've used go really well with images as well, for example, the sound used for T.V is 'white noise' and a exploding grenade for the greande etc. I also like the way that each image morphs into the next. I think the main reason it goes so well is that each image is easily changed into the next. When the car morphs into the gutair it looks smooth because the car and the gutair are pretty much the same size and orientation. Although the grenade is nothing like the gutair I think the reason he had it there was so that he could start the whole thing again with a tottaly differnt image, without making it look choppy.

Timeline of stop motion animation (Part4/4)

The most recent development in stop motion animation is another form of go motion. However this technique is different from the traditional stop motion. The objects are attached to a motor which is linked up to a computer. The motors moved the objects/puppets across the table and the computer measures the movement. The objects are then set back to their original position and the the cameras are set in place. Once the cameras start taking the pictures the motors move the objects through the same path again. As the object is moving whilst the camera is taking pictures it produces a motion blur to make it look realistic. This technique is very efficient, however it is very time consuming and quite complicated.
Here is an example of this technique being used in the film The Empire Strikes Back, with the Tauntauns.

Timeline of stop motion animation (Part3/4)

Another major development in stop motion animation was the introduction of 'go motion'. Go motion is similar to normal stop motion, however in normal stop motion the images are taken of the objects when they are still, but in the variation, go motion, the objects are moved whilst the camera shutter is still open. This gives it a blur effect to make the movments look smoother and not so choppy. This technique is often made easier with the use of a computer. Although, there are other techniques used to make the scenes look smoother. Vaseline can be used to make the objects appear to have a blur around them, this is done by smearing vaseline over the lens of the camera, then reapplying after each shot. This technique was most famously used in the terminator on the endoskelton.
Another technique was mocing the table while the film in the camera is being exopsed. Again this creates a slight blur to make it realistic. This technique was used in a few Wallace and Gromit films such Wallace and Gromit: A Close Shave and Wallace and Gromit: The Wrong Trousers. In both films the cameras are moved during a 1-2 second expousure.
'Bumping the puppet' is another technique used in go motion to give a realistic blur. This technique is risky as you have to be careful not to knock the rest of the set or any other object thats does not need to be,  but this technique is effective if done propperly. To prodcue the slight blur, the puppets in the scene are 'knocked' or 'flicked' before the frame is taken.
Here is a short clip from the terminator showing the endsoskelton.



Timeline of stop motion animation (Part 2/4)

In 1912 the first clay stop motion animation was created with Modelling Extraordinary by Walter R Booth. A few years later in December 1916 the first woman animator, Helena Smith Dayton, started experimenting with the idea of using  clay in stop motion animation. Then in 1917 she released her first animated film which was an adaption of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. The idea of using clay models in stop motion was a massive development for stop motion animation and also one of the most successful, as it is still widely being used today in films such as Wallace and Gromit and also Shaun the Sheep.
It is created in roughly the same way as earlier stop motion, by taking many photo's and placing them all together to form a film. However with claymation instead of drawings, clay is used and each model is changed every so slightly during the production of a scene. For example in Wallace and Gromit, if Wallace was to pick up a cheese cracker, a photo would have to be taken before he'd moved, then his arm would be moved about 1 millimetre and another photo would be taken. This would go on and on until he had reached the cracker and placed it in his mouth.
Here is a clip from youtube of some more recently made claymation: