Category Archives: Module 105

Stop Motion

Stop motion or stop-frame is the animation process where an object is filmed frame by frame – where it is moved incrementally, filmed, then moved again and filmed ect. creating an illusion of fluid movement.

The brief this time was similar to pixelation as we were given the same word to base our animation on – attraction. We also had to use found and broken computer and machine parts to build the sets.

We thought of doing a love story this time but it got scraped as we over heard another group planning the same thing. It wasn’t until I mention an old lamp looked like a ray gun, that we had an idea for our animation. That an evil genius build a ray gun, something goes wrong and instead of zapping people it makes people fall in love. After tweaking the idea, we finally came up with a storyboard. Having the evil genus working in his lab and on the ray gun while he says his inner monolog. The ray gun is a shrink ray and he is going to shrink everyone for being taller than him and for bullying him when he was younger, (we are going to have a flash back of when he was bullied), and a close up of him flicking the switch. We are going to have the ray gun hit three time, the 1st on two people on a bench when hit cuddle, 2nd on a man and his dog and 3rd on a big guys who walks in to the lab (while the evil genius is having a tantrum because his ray gun didn’t go as plan) and hug the evil genius.

Building the set took a lot more time and effort than we originally though. Due to the shots that we need we build two sets, one the lab and the other a park, because of this we decided it would be more time efficient to build them both out of cardboard rather than wood. We all took part on building the sets and the props needed though, I took most of the responsibility to make sure it looked right and we had every thing we need. While one of my team members made the models.

We had to keep the models design simple as we had four-five characters and we did’t want them too complex as then we would not have time to film.

Editing the footage after filming was more complex than the previous animations. Some parts had to be taken out, speeded up and slow down, as well as rearranged. We were given some advice for the shots with the evil genius at his ray and the part with the victims, that you down see him look out of the window, so we were suggested to put a circle on the park footage to make the evil genius seem as if he is looking through to outside.
That was done on animate pro/toon boom, as well as the zaps and the hearts shown in the animation.

For the voice effects I did some but we asked Purple again to dot the voice over. WE gave him little instruction other that who the character was and why he was building the ray gun. So must of it was improvised. I’m glad we asked he to do the voice over again as I feel it add some comedy to the animation.

Cut Out

Cut out is an animating technique that uses flat characters, props and backgrounds cut from materials such as paper, card, stiff fabric or even photographs. Any type of material can be used to create a cut out animation.

The brief was to choose a poem, and record sound and dialogue to create an animation using the cut out method. This was the first time we used dope sheets to help work out the animating of the speech. To help use we did a practice.

This also helped us work out what was the best way of animating the speech, for use we found that instead of make a different head for each sound to keep the same head and just change the mouth.

We agreed before this project the poem we were going to use, Have a nice day by Spike Milligan. From the beginning we wanted to do a funny and humorous animation and to have fun with it.

For the storyboard we decided to follow the flow of the poem. When the disease man spoke the frame would be on him and when the drowning was speaking it would be on him. We wanted to add something at the end of the poem when the narrator speaks, and not just have his character talking. So we thought about what he says, “but apart from that, and a fire in my flat, it’s been a very nice day”. So we got thinking, why is his flat on fire? Did he burn something? Or is it on fire because the whole city is on fire? Why is the city on fire? An alien invasion?
So at the end of the poem we have the city getting burned down with ufos shooting lasers. But it still seemed as though we needed something at the end, so I suggested that the narrator gets squished by a ‘the end’ sign, and we did.

While the others were drawing and cutting out the props, characters and setting we needed, I was working out the dope sheet and how long each mouth piece had to be held for.

None of us want to voice the poem so a member of our group asked her friend Purple (its a nickname, he wishes to stay anonymous) to voice it.

Smudge n Click

Smudge n click is an technique in which literally translates to taking a picture (click) made by a painting , rubbing or a moving a medium such as sand, ink, paint, rice ect. over a surface or background.

The brief was to take myth and monsters and create an animation. Exploring different mediums and methods to help, and add suitable sounds.

This was one that I was really looking forward to researching, because I enjoy all things related to myths and such. So it was hard for me to look up what we could do.

The first thing I did was make a list of of mythical creatures and monsters that seemed interesting or what we could create a story or make a animation about. It was a long list, and after talking with my group we decide to choose the Gorgon (Medusa) to base our animation on. As we thought it would create a challenge to animate the snakes in her hair and if we were successful it would look good.

We also decided not just to use one material but two, sand and paint. The rough story we had so far was to have a girl walking through a temple, see Medusa and get turned to stone.

We wanted to use the multi-plane (which has levels of clear surfaces so you can created depth and a background that wouldn’t be altered when animating), to animated the girls getting turned to stone. We though of using the paint to animate movement and the sand for the non-moving parts and the background.

While we were planing the animation, I was set the job of design and creating the backgrounds. Researching what a greek temple looked like and what we could add to the background. I also design some looks for the character just because I wanted to.

For the storyboard we decided to has the ‘camera’ go for one sort to another, for example go to a close up of the snakes, fade out to a close up of the girl, fad out again to Medusa’s mouth ect. We thought this would help build the tension and anxiety of want we eventually happen to the girl. During the filming I helped set the scenes and make the backgrounds out of sand. We found that ‘building’ and creating the scene took much longer than animating it.

Editing it together was simple and adding the sound, we were going to add music and a member of our group did at a later date. And though it did sound great, the music was too loud to hear the sound effects and we decided it added more to the tension with just the sound.