Finish Limerick Video + Evalution

Before we could create our film we had to make our credits. For the credits we cut out all the letters in white so they would be seen on our black background, we had this black background for when we didn't want the jungle background. We then spent the rest of the time glueing together our characters and set up the stomach for where the woman would be eaten. We cut out around the trees with a stanley knife this was to give it a clean cut so we didn't have any white edges. We did this so our tiger could go through the trees to show more depth and movement in our piece. We had our tiger exit out behind the trees so it would lead onto the next scene neatly. We set up the camera on a rostrum which gave us a high angle and we also didn't have to adjust the camera every time for a new frame. On the bottom of the rostrum is a raised plate from where we could set up each frame, then looking down the camera we could see what would be shown. We linked the laptop up with the camera so we could shoot our frames we used the softwear Istopmotion to capture the frames and then using final cut to edit it all together and finally adding our audio. When in final cut Scott had already recorded his voice over, he imported the clips and the audio and started to edit it together. He extended some of the credits so they were easier to read and our names were on screen longer,he also had to slow and pause the audio at times so it kept to speed with the animation. 

 Here is our final piece on the Limerick....

Looking back at our video I think it worked well all the animation fits with the Limerick. However if we had more time I would have tried to have some frames of the rection of being eaten by the tiger and more detial in the stomach scene, for example making a background for the scene. Another thing we could of improved was making sure all the things in the frame are in the right place before taking the shot. Throughout the piece there are a few mistakes on the animation, at one point a hand comes into the screen and also when the tiger is going through the jungle he clips through the tree one moment he is behind them then infront. Apart from these I think we have learnt more about being careful when taking each frame and to think more about what the audince will see and understand. Next time we would just need to work more on the editing and make sure the audio sound is clearer. Overall I think the main design and crafting of the anaimation has made the piece stand out and become a well animated limerick.

Limerick Animation part 1

In our lastest lessons we got shown and ex students work for a music video however they did this music video (Shown above) using cut-out-stop-motion animation and cutting out each shot using coloured card. From watching this video we then needed to make our own from a limerick. We had a number of limericks to choose from this is one we selected:

"There was a young lady of Niger
Who smiled as she rode on a tiger;
They returned from the ride
With the lady inside,
And the smile on the face of the tiger."

We picked out the key elements of the limerick and choose what we thought would be easy to show through animation and what would stand out well. We then assigned roles to each member of the group Scott worked on the storyboard and how we want our limerick to be shown as he was doing this he told us what we would need to draw out. As our main background it would be the Jungle, Doug and I set off looking for ideas of what our background would look like. We searched on Google and found a simple background that we could work from and give us a basic idea of where to start. We wanted a simple background that our tiger could walk through the Jungle. Dan then worked on drawing a tiger and a woman however these would have to move in each frame and the tiger would have to look like it was running. We needed also make it look like she was sitting on the tiger so Dan drew only half of her. We realised later on in the Limerick we could use the same drawing of the woman as it was a side view. So I had to make another one of her but as a front of view. When we put the tiger onto the jungle backgound we found that the tiger was too large for the background. We didn't have enough time to draw another tiger but because we had done small trees it just looked like the tiger was in the front of the frame and it started to give the animation depth. 

Jan Svankmjer

Jan Svankmjer is one of the world's foremost animators he was born in Prague in 1934 where he still lives today. He did all of his training in Prague in the 1950's at a institute of Applied Arts  and an Academy of Performing Arts. Making his first film in 1964 he is responsable for some of the most memorable and unique animated films.Many of his films invole objects coming to life using stop-motion many of these objects are made of clay as seen in his animation Darkness Light Darkness.

In lots of his work he used Stop motion along side live action these pieces included Alice made in 1988 his first feature-length film. This won the feature film award at the 1989 Annecy International Animated film festival. He often uses fast-motion sequences when people walk and interact but one of his trademarks is exaggerated sounds. Although much of his work is made from a childs perspective such as Down to the Cellar they sometimes have a disturbing feel and aggressive manner. His latest work was in 2010 called Surviving Life but his next project is set for release in 2015.

Sumo Science

Sumo Science are specialists in animation and work together to create fresh new animtions. Ed Patterson & Will Studd make up the team represented by Aardman Animations. They have used different styles of stop-motion, 2D, live-action and Puppetry. They have worked with a number of companies to make commercials these include Hellmans, Innocent Orange Juice, Weetos, P & O, Johnson's Baby Wipes and most recently Nokia with their Gulp animation.
The inspiration for Gulp came from their previous work on Dot also working with Nokia. Dot was the smallest stop motion character (9mm) in a film winning a Guiness world record as well as 15 major advertising awards. The brief behind Dot was to celebrate Nokia's new phone and cell scope however knowing they couldn't animate blood cells they came up with the idea of Dot. For an animation of a minute and a half they were making 4 seconds a day this video got 3 million hits on Youtube.
Nokia 'Dot' from Sumo Science on Vimeo
This lead onto Gulp the worlds largest stop-motion animation with the largest scene being over 11,000 square feet filmed on location in Pendine Beach, South Wales.This film is having rapid success online like Dot it was also filmed on a Nokia N8. In Dot they used a 3D print to create the character whereas in Gulp it was easier to use a real person for their fisherman but moving each joint like a puppet. The story of Gulp was about fisherman who catches a fish he then becomes the bait for a larger fish and sets off a chain reaction. It was shot for 5 days day and night outside with the help of a large team of animation graduates. To produce 20 seconds of animation took about 16 hours. The set of stills play back at 25 frames per second to show the motion.

Gulp. The world's largest stop-motion animation shot on a Nokia N8. from Nokia HD on Vimeo.

Box Animation 3/11/11

Today we got into groups of four and made an istop animation using a box of coins and making them come in and out of the box. To do this we set up a tripod and a video camera and had the camera pointing down to the plain blue paper and our box closed. Like Jan Svankmajer we wanted a fast paced animation of the coins to come out and move around the box in a stylish way. We set up the istopMotion on the laptop and connected it to the camera. For every move we made to the box we took a still frame of it we carried this throughout. We thought about where the pennies would go and what they would look like to our audience. We wanted the box to fall over and then the pennies could move around the table and then the pennies could go back into the box. To make it more interesting we left one coin where it was and so this coin would go into the box on its own and it would also make it easier for the lid to get back on the box without it jumping. When the box was falling we needed to balance it on its edge we were given bluetac to keep it in place the only problem with this, was because our box was see-through you could see the bluetac if we had longer on this task we could have thought of a way without using the bluetac. Each time we made a drastic movement we played it back to make sure that this main movement looked good, if it didn't look right or we got someones hand in the frame we just deleted that frame and did it again. Once we had done our final frame we took more of the same frame so that it didn't jump and start again too fast we were then done with the film but next we needed to add sounds. For making our sounds we set up final cut and imported our video and then used the voice recorder to capture the sounds we would make. To make the sounds we recorded them all individually for expample when the box clicks open.Then we started a new recording for when the lid pops off. If we needed the clip more than once we copied it the right amount of times so it all sounded the same this worked with the box closing and opening. Once all the sounds were added and put in the right place to the film we watched it back and thought if anything could have been improved. When the pennies move around the box we didn't think the sound was emphasized enough. So we copied the same clip and played it at a different time to make it sound like there was more movement. I think the sounds relate a lot back to Jan Svankmajer work and it all came together really well. Below is our final video.