3D Animation Project

The different kinds of animation and the developers of animation

The Different Kinds Of Animation

Stop-frame

• Stop-frame animation is the type of animation that involves an object physically moved by a person after a photo is taken then moved again before another photo is taken, once the photos are put in order it creates the illusion of movement. Another term for this kind of animation is called Clay-animation when a clay figure is used and is made to look like the figure is moving. Many famous animated films have used this technique such as Chicken Run and Wallace and Gromit.

Frame Rates

• Frame rates is the speed at which an animation is played across a “timeline” once all the photos are put in order.

• It is measured in the number of frames displayed per second for example: - 8 frames per second is a frame rate that's too slow, this means the animation might not appear to be smooth but if you had 24 frames per second it will create the illusion that you have filmed it happening in real life this relates to the persistence of vision

Persistence Of Vision• Persistence of vision is the phenomenon of the eye by which an afterimage is

thought to persist for approximately one twenty-fifth of a second on the retina.• The discovery of persistence of vision is attributed to the Roman poet Lucretius,

although he only mentions it in connection with images seen in a dream. In the modern era, some stroboscopic experiments performed by Peter Mark Roget in 1824 were also cited as the basis for the theory. (info found from Wikipedia)

• The Zoetrope was one of the first forms of animation to support the ‘Persistence Of Vision’ theory along with the ‘flip book’. The Zoetrope in Greek means ‘Wheel Of Life’

• The zoetrope consists of a cylinder with slits cut in the sides. Beneath the slits on the inner cylinder is a band which has either individual frames from a video/film or images from a set of drawings or photographs. As the cylinder spins, the user looks through the slits at the pictures on the opposite side of the cylinder. The scanning of the slits keeps the pictures from simply blurring together so that the user sees it as a short film looking as if it is moving.

Cut out animation

• ‘Cut out’ animation is a technique for producing animations using flat characters, props and backgrounds cut from materials such as paper, card or even photographs.

• Today, cut out-style animation is frequently produced using computers, with scanned images taking the place of physically cut materials (for example: - south park used to just use paper cut outs, now they use the paper cut outs for the backgrounds and the outline of the characters then scan them into the computer and finish the episodes from there)

Famous animators and the techniques they used

Ray Harryhausen• After having seen King Kong for the first of many times in 1933,

Harryhausen spent his early years experimenting in the production of animated shorts.

• A friend arranged a meeting with Harryhausen's idol, Willis O'Brien, animator of King Kong. O'Brien critiqued Harryhausen's early models and inspired him to take classes in graphic arts and sculpture to hone his skills.

• Harryhausen also produced a variety of other short animation demos during the post-World War II 1940s. He put together a demo reel of his various projects and showed them to Willis O'Brien, who eventually hired him as an assistant animator on what turned out to be Harryhausen's first major film, Mighty Joe Young in1949. O'Brien ended up solving the various technical problems, leaving most of the animation up to Harryhausen.

• Their work won O'Brien the Academy Award for Best Special Effects that year.

Tim Burton

• Burton was born in 1958, in the city of Burbank, California, to Jean Burton (the owner of a cat-themed gift shop) and Bill Burton(a former minor league baseball player who would later work for the Burbank Park and Recreation Department)

As a young man, Burton would make short films in his backyard on Evergreen Street using stop motion animation techniques. (One of his most famous juvenile films is ‘The Island of Doctor Agor’, that he made when he was 13 years old.)

• Later in his career he then created many films like: - The Nightmare Before Christmas, James And The Giant Peach, Edward Scissor Hands and many others.

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Walt Disney

• Walt Disney is the most famous out of all the animators known to the world (well, that's my opinion) he is known for starting the ‘Walt Disney Company’ and for creating the most loved Disney character Mickey Mouse who started off as a black and white cartoon and is now alive with colour.

• After the death of Walt Disney caused by lung cancer in 1966, his brother Roy Disney started construction of the Walt Disney resort in Florida.

• The type of animation MAINLY used by Walt Disney used before and after his death was 2-D animation which is the same as stop-frame animation.

Seth MacFarlane

• Seth MacFarlane is a well known actor, comedian and animator in the USA for his famous shows Family Guy, American Dad and The Cleveland Show.

• He has also made guest appearances in award winning shows and films for example: - Startrek: Enterprise and also giving the voice of Johann Krauss in Hellboy 2: The Golden Army

BY DARREN MIA