Go Motion

Go Motion is a technique that was invented during the filming of The Empire Strikes Back to provide motion blur in stop motion animated sequences. Check it out at Peta Pixel.

Time Lapse of Stop Motion

Tchaikovsky Timelapse from joe clarke on Vimeo.

Stop Motion Moleskine

MINI PLANNERS from Moleskine ® on Vimeo.

Oh, this commercial was shot with Dragon Stop Motion.

World's Largest Stop Motion Animation

Thanks to Brady for the heads up.

Paper cut-out animation

Here is an awesome example of paper cut-out animation. This might be a great inspiration for some of our animators here at the Media Arts Lab; specifically, the idea of using joints on characters as a way to simplify motion animation.

Meet the JBFC mobile animation cart!

 

This is a custom designed piece for our animation program that features Dragon Stop Motion and the Canon EOS Rebel T2i. The cart is fully mobile allowing students to animate just about anywhere.

Canon love.

Dragon Stop Motion

In preparation for upgrading our animation program, I've spent time exploring Dragon Stop Motion software. Currently, we've been using iStop Motion from Boinx with SD camcorders. In an effort to match the output quality of our animation program to our other classes, we're moving to HD. While iStop Motion is a simple software with a clean interface (one-button-capture/live preview) it's HD offerings were zero and iStop Motion Pro 2 is not much better. iStop has a preference for HDV camcorders and has very little support for other camera systems, specifically no Live View from video capabale SLRs. Live view is one of the most important features during the actual animation process.

I had first encountered Dragon Stop Motion during our Spring 09 semester and decided to give it a try. Everything from the interface options to the camera control was outstanding. Its Cinematography Window allows the user to control shutter speed, aperature and ISO directly from the computer (requires a DSLR). Using one of our Canon EOS Rebel T2i's I made a few short test clips and really got to experience a lot of what the software had to offer. The image below was captured through the Rebel using the test shot feature in the Cinematography Window:

 Click on above the image for an expanded view at 5184×3456

Dragon Stop Motion allows for Live Preview by locking the mirror of a video capable DSLR. With clever/intuitive features, a logical file organization system and updated camera support, Dragon surpasses my expectations. I'll continue to experiment with the software, but the love affair has begun - a romance if you will.