Mark Griffin has an innovative approach to teaching animation

Mark Griffin from Morrison Academy Kaohsiung  (MAK) in Taiwan has kindly shared his experiences teaching animation at the K-9 levels. 

The animation course introduces students to animation with a technique called "pixillation".  This means animating people in front of a camera. 

The human "puppets" move between frames, which can be captured automatically using the timelapse feature in Stop Motion Pro. The interval between capturing frames can be set to 3 seconds, giving time to reposition slightly between frames.  This excercise demonstrates very quickly that small movements between frame captures mean slower movement on screen, while big movements between frames speed things up.   The other great thing about using people to animate - no puppets need to be constructed.

Notes on this technique

- The timelapse feature is found in all editions of Stop Motion Pro ( Menu > tools > timelapse)

- The camera is locked onto a sturdy support, in this case a tripod

- The high vantage point of the camera means more people can be seen in the frame

- Extend the screen time using copy, paste and reverse in the Editor

- Turn up the volume on the computer, so everyone can hear the "beep" when a frame is captured

Animating flat paper and other bits and pieces...

Another interesting animation technique used at MAK is pointing the camera straight down at cut out shapes on a flat surface.  Unlike puppet "table top" style animation, cut out animation solves the issue of falling over puppets - everything is flat already.  Leaves, found objects, paintings and drawings can all be employed to make the film.  An article on this techinque can be found here.  Tools such as Onionskinning are fantastic for positioning elements used under the camera.

Notes on this technique

- Use a tripod and attach a camera firmly to it using a bull dog clip

- Blu-tack or poster putty is fantastic for holding down paper and other items that need to stay still

- Use old style paper fastners to create jointed puppets

- Hallogen or flourescent desklamps provide strong illumination and help eliminate distracting shadows

The well loved "brick film" table top technique is also very popular.  Easy to use bricks and mini figures are a great introduction to stop motion animation.  Students can even bring thier own collection in to animate. 

 Notes on this technique

- Keep the ideas simple

- Check your focus when starting to film, being so small and close to the camera is a challenge.

- Use desklamps to help control shadows from ambient light sources

- Poster putty is great for keeping things in place while working.