Wooden Spoon: Background tester

I've created another trial video, not focusing on the characters or story lines but on the movement of the background. Using the wooden spoon characters, i created a short little story about them becoming stranded on a desert island, the story is a bit silly and the character movement isn't the best but i wanted to show how if the background is moving as well as the characters it gives them more of an effect that they are moving from place to place!

Under the Sea....

So I've had a go at creating a video just to trial the idea of an infinity background, I've made a few little sea creature and just animated them by moving across the screen. I've deliberately not created a story for these characters as I feel that it is not an important factor at this stage. I think the video is successful and shows everything i wanted to. There are a few points that are slightly out of focus, however with professional lighting I will be able to rectify this!

Trial stop motion: Round Two

Okay, so I've re-shot the space video and I'm ten times more pleased with it. I designed the characters to be smaller and more robust able to cope better with the movements. There are points in the video which i can identify are out of focus however with professional, 3 point lighting i will be able to do right by this if i choose to go ahead with the plasticine.

Video disaster!!!

I've finally finished shooting my video that I'm using as a trial for plasticine stop motion, and I think that I'm safe to say that it was a total disaster!! Initially the characters looked fantastic however they were unsuitable for the animation type, they require to have smaller bodies and studier legs instead of smaller legs and bigger bodies which resulted in them falling over frequently and becoming quite worn looking. Another massive problem was that the majority of the video is out of focus, I believe that i was giving the camera too much to concentrate on with a busy background, mid ground and foreground! Not only this but the movement of the characters and story line was too complex therefore making the overall video look shambolic and unprofessional....

My next step is to re do the video, thinking up a simplistic short story and creating better more controllable characters, that will be able to deal with the movement i require! I am very disappointed with the outcome of this video, however I didn't use professional lighting, and maybe was too brash with the movement of the characters. By hopefully re doing the video i can identify where i went wrong this time and be able to try to put them right this time!

Story Boards

I've created some story boards to follow whilst filming my trial video, the story is going to be really basic, about an astronaught & aliens who both land on a new planet and try to claim it as their own!

Finished characters

I've had lots of fun creating these little characters and think that they look really good, i'd be happy to use this technique for my final piece, however i want to see how well they can move in terms of animation.....

Character design ideas

The annotated pictures above are the plans that I've had for the different characters that I plan to create! I will upload another picture to show the finished characters! 

Ideas for trialling Plasticine....

Below is a spider diagram with some ideas i'm having for the video I will be creating out of plasticine....

I think that I will begin to design some characters, and think of a short story surrounding the theme of space! It will most likely be aimed at children, so it will be a happy-go-lucky storyline!

The next few stages.....

After a tutorial with my FMP supervisor, my next step is to try out all the different types of 3D stop motion.  I've uploaded the tutorial notes so that I can track my progress throughout the next couple of weeks....

So my next step is to do a trial stop motion video using plasticine, which i have ordered! For good practice I plan to story board my video so that i know exactly what i need to make, can plan the backgrounds and any props that i need. It also means that i can think about what sounds i need to accompany the video. I plan to have this completed & uploaded by the 30th of March!!

My next step also for the 30th of March is to trial different types of backgrounds for my videos, this will likely to be coinciding with the plasticine video, as i will try different styles then. 

Finally I plan to create a tester, mini advert to see how it looks and to see if it stretches my ability as an animator enough, and shows all i can do. This I plan to have done by 20th of April.

So I have a lot to do, and must start to chip away at it, hopefully by the end of the week i will have an idea of exactly what i want to create and will be able to either shoot my video over the weekend or next week!

Below are some examples of plasticine stop motion videos:

 

Advertising & Stop Motion

Going back to the beginning

Just looking back over my research from the beginning to now I have realised that I am overlooking some amazing pieces of stop motion, these pieces have been most inspiring to me and I think that I need to realise exactly why I like them and maybe ask myself why can't I do this?

I truly believe that with careful planning, consideration and time management and I can definitely create something as cool and amazing as the following videos:

Group Tutorial

After a class session, I have had a small insight of what i'm going to do for my FMP.
Now that i've decided that I really don't want to do the drawn 2D stop motion, I 'pitched' the idea of doing a selection of two or three adverts.
The response i got was overall positive with some advice to look at infomericals, another piece of advice i thought was interesting was to do my journey as an animator. I'm not too sure if this is an achievable project to do but it's definitely one I will consider.

What's important?

When creating my FMP I need to make sure I keep in mind what is important and the things I always wanted to achieve when I began this project.
So what is important, i've listed things that I believe are very important in purple and some things that could potentially be important in green.
Making it standout
Mixing people with stop motion
Unique
Using different camera angles
Type of editing
Use of professional editing programme
Creating several videos all with the same or similar themes.