Creating our Stopmotion Animation

The time had finally arrived for Sam and myself to begin our first Stop motion animation. The research had been done, the storyboards were written and the materials acquired. now all that we needed was to be in the same place at the same time to get things started. I guess a certain amount of collaborative skills were used in that process and we decided to set out two separate full days for making the animation. The first day for filming and the second for editing and sound.

Creating a space and setting up

We began nice and early to make the best use of time and the first part was the create a space and build our set. We decided to use my house and work desk for this as there wouldn't be many distractions and if we ran over the day planned for filming we would be able to leave things in place. We built the set on my desk and move things around to create an artificial back wall for the desk so there was a short depth of field. We decided not to purchase a camera/ phone tripod and not only did we save money but we had good fun being creative and designing our own camera apparatus.

After doing our research we decide to use two lamps, to limit shadows and create a softer light. We placed these either side of our set either side of our camera to create and even light. We experimented using a third lamp and also with removing and replacing the shades to see what different effects it would create and what worked best with the camera. 

We measured out our newplast and decided how much we'd need to leave spare in case any bits were mushed together with other colours. A little practical maths was used in order to work out how much newplast would be need to make the final piece, which would be a combination of the smaller pieces. 

  

Filming

 In filming process took us about ten hours, but that was including setting up, breaks and lots discussion about various techniques and problems as they arose. On reflection, I'm glad that for your first production we decided to keep it simple as it was a good opportunity just to learn all the things that can go wrong. 

Keeping things in place- We thought at the time, that the camera app we were using didn't have an option to have a shadow of the last image taken on the scene when lining up the next shot (we've since found out there was). So at the time we worked on the simple technique of placing a small item on the set in place on the piece we were moving. In time we also came to realise that this was good for remembering the direction pieces where moving in too. This was particularly useful when it came to the scenes where the objects were jumping. 

Keeping the Frame Still- We wanted to make sure that we could keep the frame as still as possible throughout the filming so we used the newplast to tack down all the part of the set and also the make camera tripod. We even stuck the camera to it tripod. The main problem we had though was with the touch screen, as tapping it to take the shot was difficult to do without moving the camera slightly. this was one of the disadvantages of using the phone. A webcam through Zu3d could have been operated remotely removing this obstacle. Between filming and writing the post I have since found out that you can remotely operate the camera on a phone using a headphone remote, and the same button you use to answer calls.

Problems with the light- Another disadvantage of using the phone was that is was constantly refocusing and filtering light differently as light changed slightly throughout the day. We did close the curtains but that did not block out the light completely. Because filming can be a long process, I'd highly recommend using a room where you can block out all light, or if you are filming over a number of days, plan to do it around the same time. Also, if your camera has an automatic white balance, you may need to turn this off.

Editing

We met up on a separate day to do the editing, again giving ourselves a whole day to go through the process. The first obstacle we came across was saving the final product into a movie on Sam's phone so we could upload it to the Macbook. Because we had used ultra HD we had already had to delete large amounts of Sam's phone data in order to take all the pictures. we then had to delete further pictures and the whole of Sam's music in order to create the movie file. Again this was another oversight in using the phone app for this longer animation. i think the ease with which we were able to then upload it and edit it on the  Macbook possibly made up for any initial problems. We were able to change the speeds of individual frames easily, just as you can on Zu3d, and then began to play around with creating a title. We had originally thought to use a claymation title, but we decided to vary the materials used and take inspiration from one of the many stop motions videos on youtube.

Sound and Music- After creating our title and timing the whole piece correctly, we began to work on the sounds and music. We had storyboarded the SFX so we knew what we were looking for and began to trawl through free sound clip sites. After unsuccessfully finding ones which suited we began to experiment with creating our owns sounds. The problem that we found was that because we where sourcing sounds from all different place that the sounds didn't seem to quite fit with the animation. even slowing down the piece and changing the pitch left the sound clips sounding as though they didn't come form the scene. In the end, in order to maintain the flow of the piece we settled for a music track which fit with the theme of the piece. 

The finished Article: here it is !!

Self Evaluation 

The original concept of this piece was to create a simple claymation stop motion video that explored the subject of conflict in a creative manner. I was happy that the overall visual piece reflected what i had initially envisaged, however, the I believe the message was lost through the poor application of sound to the piece. Initially many different SFX had been storyboarded to the piece, those which included battle sounds and movie clips. I think that with better planning, practise and subsequently better experience we would have been able to do this, but none the less I was pleased with the overall product.

Working on the animation allowed me to see the many challenges and therefore potential skills to be acquired through making an animation and also gained an understanding that those challenges and skills would be very different for a variety of people and a variety of ages. To take myself for example, when hearing at the start of the module that i would be making a stop motion animation I knew immediately that my biggest challenge would be working with ICT, an area I know that i need to develop confidence in. I also realised that working in a group or pair would be difficult for me as i usually prefer to work alone. However, needing some assistance with the ITC side of things pushed me into working with Sam and we pooled our skills to create what turned out to be a good team. Working on a stop motion animation could also help to develop any number of skills including:

• Individual patience
• Working with others
• Research skills
• Critical thinking and expression 
• ITC skills 
• Sound and audio
• Lighting
• Art and Design

The above list is not a definitive one and this production has help me to understand there is something different to be gained by everyone from this task. Where as I feel that I benefited from working with Sam and developing my patience for ITC, other members of the group may have taken it as an opportunity to express their interest and feeling about challenging contemporary subjects. This project for me demonstrated the significance of process over outcome. Although I was reasonably pleased with the final product, I believe it will be the skills I learnt during the process and enjoyment of making the animation that I will reflect upon most.