As part of my research, I’ve decided to buy a book. I used to think that all the information you could ever want was freely available on the Internet, but it seems that claymation and stop-motion animation might be a bit of a small niche, even for the word wide web. Sites like animateclay.com are good, but they just don’t seem to go into enough depth, or suggest alternative ways of doing things beyond the scope of products they sell in their e-shops.

The book I purchased (and will be eagerly awaiting for in the post) is called Stop Motion: Craft Skills for Model Animation. There are a few others that I’d like to get my hands on, but I’ll try reading this one first and pass on any good tips I find.

It’s not quite perfect, but not bad for a first attempt. I’m quite pleased with it!

It took ages! The whole process of preparation, creating the model, setting up, shooting, creating the video and then editing it took just over 2 hours! At first I was a little bit disappointed of how the mouth didn’t quite match the words very well, but then I thought it would be better to create something than to throw it all away. My old art teacher used to go mental if I threw anything in the bin, so if you ever stumble onto this site I hope your happy! lol.

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“The Blue Blob” is my second attempt at stop-motion. Whilst in my previous blog post I said I would try out new software, I was riddled with technical problems. So, I stuck with Windows Movie Maker. Not because there is anything wrong with AnimatorHD (that I have found yet), more due to the fact that the camera I was using let me down and didn’t quite give me the options and settings I require.

Whilst filming, I was hit suddenly with a message telling me that the battery was low. About 3 seconds later the camera completely died on me. Unfortunately, the cable connecting it to my laptop does not recharge the camera. The batteries that required replacing are situated underneath the camera, which meant I couldn’t remove them whilst still connected to the tripod. It was a bit of a disaster. Moving the camera or tripod slightly would mean that I’d have to start all over again.

After much frustration, stomping around the house looking for batteries, and making weird growling noises I finally managed to resolve the problem by replacing 3 of the 4 batteries (which was very difficult). Once I finished filming I transferred my files over the my laptop to find that several frames (photos) were missing. This is why the walking animation at the start suddenly jerks forward, and why the ball rolling in and up to become the Blue Blob’s nose isn’t very fluid. This may have had something to do with the camera saying it’s memory was full on the last photo I took, or because the batteries died? I’m not sure what happened really, but I will definately have another pop at this once I get my new camera (which I recieved today, with a cracked screen.. dammit! – now awaiting a replacement).

Loads of stuff went wrong, but I was determined to get a video out of the evening’s work. I learnt a lot as I tried to make the animation a bit more complex and I’m still happy with the results, but hope I am not quite as unlucky next time.

In order to make my stop-motion animation I used the following items:

• A digital camera (although you can use a webcam)
• A tripod
• Windows Movie Maker (free with Vista)
• White Card
• A paperclip
• Plasticine (I bought a big box from Toys R Us for £9.99, although they also do packets for about £1 each)
• A desk light/lamp

Plasticine doesn’t dry out, so it’s perfect for shaping/moulding and animating. This sort of stop-motion animating is called “Claymation” in the UK, although I think it’s a copyrighted term in the US. If you leave plasticine too long it can go a bit hard, so leave it next to a light source to warm it up, or just use your hands if it is ok to re-shape it.

I set up the camera on a tripod to help prevent the shots/photos from being taken from different places. I also used a desk light to try and keep it as consistent as possible, rather than using/relying on daylight. This also helped prevent the need for a camera flash which is annoying as it was far too bright and caused the pictures to miss out on some details like the eyes.

I made my green blob out of plasticine. I cut 2 straight pieces of a paperclip and used them to attach the eyes to the body to help keep them in place. This isn’t required bit it helps I think.

I took over 70 pictures in total for my animation. Within each one I moved the green blob a bit, amended the mouth and the location of the eyes. Once I had “filmed” my “scene” I used a USB cable to attach the camera to the PC in order to transfer all my photos.

Within Windows Movie Maker I went to “Tools > Options”, then the “Advanced” tab to change the picture duration to 0.125 seconds (the fastest it will go). This then inserted the properties to all the images I imported into the software and added to the timeline to create my animation. All I had to do then was export my movie.

I think that covers everything. Obviously time will be taken experimenting with your camera, lighting, and various other technical elements and techniques. Creating stop-motion (or claymation) videos is a lot of fun but does require loads of patience.

As I’m a beginner I am also still experimenting and learning. Tonight I hope to create a new animation using a free version of AnimatorHD.If there is something you feel I have missed out, or if you have any other question regarding stop-motion animation please feel free to ask me in the comments below or on the forum.

It’s a fairly short clip bulked out a little by credits and stuff to help bring site traffic and turn off potential media thieves. The animation sequence is about 6-8 seconds which required over 70 separate photographs and took about 30 minutes to make. The software used to create the final result was Windows Movie Maker (bundled with Windows Vista).

For my next claymation video I will be looking at adding more fluid animation, adding sound, and experimenting with Stop Motion Pro to see if it offers much in the way to justify it’s hefty price tag. I have several story and character ideas for when I get a little bit better at this, so be sure to check back at the site often for more videos.