Animation Book Toc

7/30/2019 Animation Book Toc

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Learn Movie Making

with Stop Motion

Animation

by

Nate & Ryan Eckerson


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Learn Movie Making with Stop Motion Animation

Published and distributed by

NR ProductionsPO Box 967North Dighton, MA 02764www.nr-productions.com

1st Edition

Windows and Windows Movie Maker are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.Other designations of products and companies may be the trademarks of theirrespective owners. Twelve Stones Research is not associated with anyproduct or vendor mentioned in this book.

2006 Nate and Ryan Eckerson

All rights reserved. This book may not be copied,reproduced or transmitted in part or in whole in any formwithout the written consent of the copyright holders.
http://www.nr-productions.com/http://www.nr-productions.com/


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Table of Contents

Introduction........................................................................1

How this book works........................................................2

How movies work, and a short history of animation ....3

Puppet Animation........................................................................8Object Animation.........................................................................8Pixilation......................................................................................9Papermation................................................................................9Sand & Paint Animation..............................................................9

What you need to get started.........................................10

What you need #1: Computer.......................................................10

What you need #2: a camera........................................................12What you need #3: Animation program.........................................14What you Need #4: Sound.............................................................16What you need #5: Lights..............................................................16What you need #6: Video editor....................................................17

Windows Movie Maker..............................................................18iMovie........................................................................................18Professional editing software....................................................19

What you need #7: Miscellaneous stuff that'll be handy................21

Creating Stories...............................................................23

Screenplays...................................................................................24Storyboarding.................................................................................25

Building a good set.........................................................27

Indoor Sets.....................................................................................27

Outdoor sets..................................................................................29Securing your sets..........................................................................31

Lighting............................................................................33

Lighting problems...........................................................................34Lighting Effects...............................................................................35


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Setting up your camera..................................................36

Camera controls.............................................................................37Using a digital video camera..........................................................39

Analog Camcorders..................................................................40

Digital Camcorders.........................................................................42Using a digital still camera..............................................................43First problem: Camera design...................................................44Second problem: Frame conversion.........................................45Other things to consider............................................................46

Keeping the camera steady............................................................47

The big moment--animating!..........................................54

Quick start......................................................................................55Animation technique.......................................................................56

The walk cycle and the run cycle...............................................56Walk cycle.................................................................................56How fast do they move?............................................................57Run cycle..................................................................................58Easy jumping.............................................................................58

Animating conversations...........................................................59Don't forget to have fun!............................................................60

Fine points of the animation software.............................................60Onion skinning..........................................................................62Getting smooth playback...........................................................63Video format..............................................................................63Compression.............................................................................65

Adding sound to your movie..........................................67

Recording sound............................................................................67

Audio files.......................................................................................70Advanced audio.............................................................................70Music..............................................................................................72

Editing in Windows Movie Maker..................................73

Overview........................................................................................73Editing basics.................................................................................76Organization...................................................................................77Introduction to Windows Movie Maker...........................................78

Collection..................................................................................81Importing Video.........................................................................82Importing Sound........................................................................84Missing sources........................................................................84Timeline....................................................................................87

Adding video to the timeline......................................................88


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Adding Audio to the Timeline....................................................89Viewer.......................................................................................91

Moving clips...................................................................................95Trimming and Splitting..............................................................97Copying and pasting..................................................................99

Storyboard...............................................................................100Transitions..............................................................................100

Effects..........................................................................................104Titles............................................................................................105

Recording Sound and Dialog:..................................................108Exporting: making it ready to share.............................................109Editing: Tips and tricks.................................................................113

For scenes with little movement..............................................113Easy conversations.................................................................114

Live action capture..................................................................114Additional Movie Maker Resources.........................................117Windows Movie Maker shortcuts............................................118

Special Effects on a budget.........................................120

Flashlight effects..........................................................................120Fire..........................................................................................121Rocket Engine.........................................................................121

Big clouds of smoke................................................................122Cozy look................................................................................123

Lightning flashes..........................................................................123Using a green screen (or blue screen).........................................123Going beyond: Digital effects.......................................................124

Showing and Sharing Your Animations.....................127

Playing animations on the computer............................................127Making a DVD..............................................................................128Connecting your computer to a TV set.........................................128Online movie collections...............................................................129Respecting other's rights..............................................................130

Video files and formats.................................................132

Container Formats.......................................................................132

File name extensions..............................................................133Codecs & Compression...............................................................134Container Format List...................................................................136Codecs.........................................................................................139

AVI codecs..............................................................................140QuickTime codecs..................................................................143


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Using VirtualDub...........................................................146

Compressing a File......................................................................148Converting video clips into pictures.........................................152Simple Editing with VirtualDubMod..........................................154

Acknowledgments.........................................................156


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Introduction

People have always loved stories.

You can tell a story just by talking. Or, you can write yourstory down and share it with others. And you might drawsome pictures to make your story more life-like. The best

stories are the ones that seem almost real.

That's why we love movies.

Ever since the 1880's, when Thomas Edison invented thefirst practical way to capture and share real life action,people have been fascinated by movies.

Of all the ways we can tell stories, movies may be the

most powerful.

Did you ever finish reading a great book and think, I wish Icould make a movie of this!

Or, did you ever watch a movie of a book you had readand say, They ruined it! I could do a better job!

Or maybe you have a great story idea of your own.

Stop Motion Animation is a way to make your own movieswithout a big budget, a cast of talented actors and a studiofull of life size sets. You won't need to draw any cartoonfigures either! Your actors are probably around yourhouse already, and your home computer gives you a wayto film and edit your story.

This book will tell you how to start today!

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How this book works

To enjoy this book to its fullest extent, you need acomputer. We recommend a machine running WindowsXP, but you can do many of the things in the book withWindows 98 Second Edition. See the back cover for a full

list of requirements. A Mac computer is great, but thesoftware CD in the back of this book is only for Windows.You can still do most of the activities with a Mac.

This book is written for those familiar with basic computerterms. We're talking basic here: if you can open, edit, andsave a document in a text editor, you are fully capable ofcompleting any task in this book. You should also know

how to organize files in folders and install software from aCD.

A little knowledge of photography is helpful, but notnecessary. If you've ever used a digital camera and image-editing program, you're way ahead. (We didn't know athing about those subjects when we started!)

If you see a word in bold, look for a definition box in thesame chapter to explain what it means.

The most important requirement is imagination, creativity,and the desire to see your ideas become reality. Bringplenty of outside-the-box ingenuity too, because you'regoing to need it!

Expect to have fun!

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Chapter 1

How movies work, and a

short history of animation

Time for a little science! Once you understand how themoving picture works, you'll see how toys, models, andeveryday objects come to life in a stop-motion movie.

In its most basic form, a movie is many, many pictures of amoving object. When these pictures are shown quickly,one after the other, the eye is tricked, and sees motion.This effect is called persistence of vision.

TV's, computers, movie projectors or anything with amoving picture uses the persistence of vision effect.

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Illustration 1: The thaumatrope


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Early "moving picture" inventions were quite different fromtoday's TV set. We'll show you a few of them.

The Thaumatrope was the first persistence of vision toy. Itwas made of string and a piece of paper, with pictures

printed on both sides. When you twirled the strings, thepaper spun around, and the pictures blended together intoa scene. Usually each side of the paper would contain halfa scene. When you spun the Thaumatrope, the twoscenes combined and you saw the entire thing.

The next invention was more interesting. The Zoetropeshowed something really moving instead of a still image.By looking at the above picture you can get a better idea ofhow the device worked. A series of pictures was printedon a circular piece of material, and placed inside theZoetrope. By spinning the Zoetrope and looking throughthe slits, you saw an endlessly looping animation, usuallyof lions jumping through hoops, or horses galloping.Zoetropes were a popular toy during the Victorian era.

We mention this next invention because there's a goodchance you've already seen one. Maybe you've made aflipbook animation in the corner of your math notebook!Flipbooks have nothing to do with stop motion, but are

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Illustration 2: The zoetrope


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another example of persistence of vision.

The Zoetrope was improved withthe invention of the Praxinoscope,a machine that used mirrors toimprove the Zoetrope's image. Avariant of the Praxinoscope couldproject the image on a screen! The

inventor hoped to get rich with hisdevice, but by the time thePraxinoscope came along,audiences were already fascinatedwith early movie projectors.

So what is a movie projector, andhow does it work?

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Illustration 3: A flipbook

Illustration 4: Thepraxinoscope


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When an early movie camera"rolled film," it snappedpictures; click, click, click... atthe rate of 24 pictures, or

"frames," per second. Theframes were recorded ontorolls of photo film. When themovie was done, the film hadto be developed withchemicals. When the filmreturned from the lab, it hadbecome a long roll of celluloid, a clear, plasticmaterial, on a reel, with theframes printed on it. This was"film" that could be playedwith a movie projector.

The projector unwound the roll at the same rate the film

had moved through the camera. As the film unwound, theframes passed in front of a bright light. The light shonethough the film, and the image created was magnified andfocused onto a large screen. There, everyone could see it.

So how was stop motion invented?

A movie camera was modified to capture a single frame ata time, like an ordinary still camera. In front of the camera,a miniature set with movable puppets was placed. Eachtime the camera captured a frame, an object in the set wasmoved. The object (let's say it was a figure of a person)would move like it was walking, running, playing, orsitting... in little increments. Filming a running sequencewould go like this: Click! (move figure's hand) Click!

(move figure's hand) Click! (move figure's hand and foot)Click! (move figure's hand and foot) Click!...

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Illustration 5: 8mm film--noticethe frames


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When the film wasplayed back, the fig-ure appeared tomove, all thanks to

persistence of vision.Filmmakers werequick to find uses forthe new technology.Some of them animat-ed pictures, drawing ascene and graduallychanging the content.Others used stop-mo-tion to do impossiblethings, the very firstspecial effects.

Stop motion remainedin theaters throughout movie history. In America, hand-

drawn "cel" animation became more and more popular(think Disney), while stop motion remained the realm ofspecial effects. Some of the more famous examplesremain, in movies like King Kong, and the work of RayHarryhausen.

While entirely stop-motion films were popular in other partsof the world, the genre was slow to appear in the US. The

first popular stop-motion works were TV shows. Gumbyand Davy and Goliath are some well-known examples.Bob the Builder is a stop-motion show that is populartoday.

Stop-motion films are more popular today than everbefore. Recent movies, like Wallace and Gromit: TheCurse of the Were Rabbit, Chicken Run, Tim Burton's

Corpse Bride, and others prove that stop-motion is notonly popular, but very profitable!

So what about you? You're probably not a professionalfilmmaker with a big studio and lots of cash. Why should

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Illustration 6: Mother Goose by RayHarryhausen (1946)


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you be interested in stop motion?

The home computer changed the world of filmmaking in abig way. It put lots of creative power into the hands ofeveryday people. You don't need a lot to create stop

motion films anymore. With this book, camera and a half-decent computer, you can make movies that look betterthan anything the early animators created.

Many people are discovering how easy and fun it is tomake stop-motion films. That's what this book is about!

Stop motion can refer to many different kinds of

animation. Here are some of them:

Puppet Animation

Simple skeletons, called armatures, are made out of athin, flexible material, usually wire, or special pieces ofmetal. Clay, foam, rubber, fabric, and other things arewrapped around this skeleton, until it looks like a

character. This character is animated with basic stop-motion technique.

Toys and action figures can be used instead of armatures.(The creators of this book really like to make Brickfilms,which are animations with LEGO bricks.)

Object Animation

Instead of a human or animal-like puppet, everydayobjects can star in your film. There is no limit to what youcan do with this technique! Anything on your desk, underthe bed, on the floor, or in the the drawer can be a star inyour film.

Most of what we've written about in this book applies to

puppet animation and object animation. But there's nothingstopping you from experimenting with other forms.

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Pixilation

In pixilation, (not to be confused with video pixelation)people act like living armatures, moving one frame at atime in sync with the camera. Interesting effects can beachieved with pixilation. You can interact with yourcharacters and other fun stuff.

Papermation

Paper animation (sometimes called "cutout animation"),describes any kind of stop-motion film made with flatmaterials. Animating is done on a flat surface, like a table.A camera is placed above the table, pointing straightdown. Anything flat can be animated; photos, card stock,newspaper and magazine cutouts. If you're making amovie with a travel theme, try moving a small figure acrossa map and drawing a line in its trail.

Sand & Paint Animation

These two are difficult, but very unique. Sand animation isdone on top of a "lightbox"a glass-topped box with lightshining up from inside it. Similar to paper animation, thecamera is positioned above the box, pointing downwards.Sand is visible as a black shadow on top of the glass. Youanimate the sand by pushing it into new patterns.

Paint animation is similar. A lightbox can be used, but it isoptional. Instead, slow-drying paint is animated on a glasssurface. The changing, shifting motion of these methods isvery beautiful.

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