Mar 28, 2010

Beautiful stop frame animation

For a few months we’ve been into stop frame animation, sure it’s been around for a long time, but we;re gonna post a few examples of how stop frame motion can give a much more emotive feel for video work. Once upon a time the only way to produce animation was to use “Stop Frame Animation”, ie. move something very slightly and take a photo of it each time… when run together you get motion. That’s old school, but it is often the case the old ways are often the best for different reasons.

for years filmmakers such as the legendary Ray Harryhausen used this method to produce mind blowing animations of dinosaurs and skeleton warriors in films before the computer became the pre-eminent production method. Ray Harryhausen was the main exponent of this style in Hollywood movies such as Jason and the Argonauts and the Sinbad series, one look at his website will give you a great idea of what he is about.

This is the video for the single from Oren Lavie called “Her Morning Elegance” it’s a beautiful example of how stop frame animation can be used to explore an idea. Call it art for arts sake if you want, but in this case it suits the music perfectly. (It has obvious similarities (too similar some say) to a video by the artist Mitchell Rose, have a look here click)

The video show just how an idea can come to life using one technique over another… imagine if this had been produce in a 3d computer style, it would have nothing like the same emotion, drawn either.

Everybody likes this movie, and indeed Stop Frame Animation. As usual click the movie to go to youtube and watch it. It’s well worth 5 minutes of your day.

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