Pre-production

Tom the killer octopus

In the lesson we received the brief that we are meant to create an animation for. 

Brief 

We then decide who we wanted to do this with. From past experiences i felt that I work well with Callum and that we tend to produce work at its best when we work together, we can both add something across and make it work at its highest standard. 

We started to look at some videos online and think which kind of animation we would like to do. It was the research I guess that made us realise Cut out animation is something we can both do and can both do something that links with it, we done it before and thought is the best out of the other 3 we was thinking of. 

 In the brief it says to produce a brainstorm which we began to do. we started to just write down exactly what we was thinking, all from our mind. It didn't make sense but then when we decided what we wanted to do it was easy which side we wanted to do towards 

Brainstorm 

As well as that we each had to write up two different proposals. We managed to do that in a lesson.  

Callums Proposal 

My proposal 

Producing a pre-production folder, you will need a storyboard of what will be happening, You will need a paper idea of it all. I have produced my own mini Storyboard for the idea e have came up with.

Our storyboard 

When we were thinking of the name for the animation we managed to produce a small survey on what name people prefer to call an octopus. We designed a table and came up with some names. Went around the class asking which name they would prefer.

Table
From the table you can see that To the Octopus was the most popular name so we have called our mini cut out animation Tom the Octopus which we think goes pretty well with the whole idea. 

Every production, animation or film needs a production schedule to know what will be going on and when. It will include the time it starts and where its taking place. For ours we included the time the production will begin which is at 1:00pm and where which is NCN Adams Building.

Production schedule 

Clay animation

what is clay animation ? 
Clay animation is when you have a bit of clay and you make something out of it like an object or some sort of creature. Then you make it do something so you move it round or move its arms and legs to make it do something. Its all done with clay so its all clay animated.

What I did?
I manged to make a mini clay animated little monster or gust. I named it Tincky and it was a pink colour with two googly eyes. I made it look like it was flying around with the rainbow in the background. The animation is called 'Rainbow love'.

If i did this again what would i do differently? 

If I did this again I would think of a better idea as my character/ monster didn't have much of a movement, it just looked like it was moving around like the body didn't move etc. It wasn't as smooth as I wanted it to be and it didn't look really professional. i should have made her arms move and maybe did something else, not just move around the screen. 

Why do I like these clay animations?
I like these two animations because Shaun the sheep was my favorite animated cartoon I used to watch on CBBC when I was younger, I used to love it but I never new how it was made.
The first one includes Pingu which I remember I also used to watch when I was younger, There were short animated clips made that just popped up between programs. These animations bring back memories and the way they are made is so creative, i like them a lot.

Frames per second

FPS (Frames per second)

what is FPS?

FPS stand for frames per second, a measurement for how many unique following images a camera can handle each second. 

Low-end digital still cameras typically have a frame rate of 1fps. Low end digital video cameras typically have a frame rate of 30fps, 25fps and even less depending on what needs to be filmed and how fats or slow, the second matter the most as they are very important. 

Object animation

Today we manged to create a 13 second mini animation. It went so well as this time we got enough time to edit it. I feel that it looks very good but so simple.

We used a money bank which was the shape of a camper-van and added a knitted mini hat on top to make it look cute. We used a Pikachu toy to make it look more realistic which didn't actually work. we made it look like it was walking to the van and then gets on, It crashed into a pool of water and he died. he fell in as it crashed.

What we can improve? 

I feel that if we got a chance to do this again, I would improve on the idea more and make it look more exciting and make it look more professional. I feel that it was okay for doing it first time. I would make it look more smooth so it doesn't jump. 

What I like? 

I like this because i find it so funny how they have used everyday objects like fruits and food, the way they used the pickle made it look better. The music does get a little annoying but it goes with the animation. 

Pixelation Animation

In the lesson we managed to film a mini animation. it was just taking images but then we edited it together so it looked like a mini film.  We had to think of an idea on spot which was very hand, we changed the hole idea so many times and at the end it still didn't work well. Had to take pictures of every single moment like as the feet moves just a little bit, then when we put it together it will flow nicely. We made a mini animation with a girl walking down the stairs, unfortunately we didn't have enough time to change the location but we used what we had and the location which was the closest. 

What we need to improve? 

If we get to do this again next time we will improve the idea we came up with. It all seemed so silly and didn't work as well as we wanted it to, it didn't look professional and just ugly. Although it was what Faye asked for but we should of thought of a better location which would have made it stand out.

what is pixelation animation? 

  'Stop motion technique where live actors are used as a frame-by-frame subject in an animated film, by repeatedly posing while one or more frame is taken and changing pose slightly before the next frame or frames. The actor becomes a kind of living stop motion puppet.'

https://www.google.co.uk/#q=pixilation+animation

What I like? 

I like this animation because i feel that it was done so well, it looks so smooth and professional. I like how they have just done it in black and white adds to the effect. The way they used the hands at the start was done well as well. 

Cut out Animation

In this lesson I and a few of others in my team managed to make a stop motion animation. It wasn't the best but we was very proud of it. We used cut out animation as in cutting out materials to make it look like scene we wanted. We used paper, card, tissue paper, blue tack. We made the blue tissue paper the clouds and we made the brown cards birds flying together. As they reached each other we made them look like they was about to kiss and love hearts appeared which made it so cute.

What we need to improve? 

When importing the images we took we realised they was videos instead so we couldn't edit them how we wanted. We wasn't able to put it in an editing software and edit it as it just didn't come together well enough. 

I think next time we should take a little longer to actually think of a good idea and make sure we know how the camera settings work because we obviously didn't know. 

 What is stop motion animation? 

Stop motion animation is basically many images put together showing a motion. Frame by frame. When a photo is taken, the object for example moves just a little, then again photo gets taken ... on repeat till it makes a mini animation when the images are edited together. It's like 100+ photos are put next to each other to make it a moving animation, making it look like its changing etc.

I like this animation because I feel that its been done so professionally, it looks amazing the way its done. It does look like its made out of paper but at the same time it does look like a dog, its so smooth and doesn't have any awkward jumps which makes it look more professional.

History of animation

The Magic Lantern (1650)

The magic lantern was a translucent oil painting including a lens and a simple candle or an oil lamp. In a dark room the image will magically appear on a flat surface as the light will projecting it through. It was the first animation project ever to start the world of animation.

  Thaumatrape 

A device invented in 1825. It involved a disk with tow images on each side so as you turned it around or made it spin it looked like a mini animated short story etc.  It both combined into one picture. 

It made it look like that object was just inside the other or over.

John Ayrton Paris.was the inventor 

Zoetrope 

William George Horner invented the first ever Zoetrope after the Thaumatrape in he 1834.

A Zoetrope is one of several pre-film animation devices which was made to produce the illusion of motion animation (motion pictures)by displaying a sequence of drawings or photographs as they role around. The images appear when a light us shine apron it it, it reflects through. 

Flip book

A flip book or a flick book is a book with series of images drawn, printed or copied. that change slowly from one page to the next. You can speed it up to make the pace faster etc. When the pictures appear the animate acting out motions telling  story. It will look like a mini animated film on paper. 

The first animated Flip book was made in September 1868 It was first made by John Barnes Linnett. This was under the name moving image. 

Kinetoscope 

 Thomas A. Edison and William Dickson of the United States in 1891

this ks a strip of film that was passed rapidly between a lens and an electric light bulb while the viewer peered through a peephole so it also reflected through to reach the viewer. 

This was also an early attempt by the two to create a sound- film system. 

Cinematographe

In February 13 1895, Louis and Auguste ( Lumiere brothers) presented the first cinematographe.  

Their Cinématographe combined a camera for recording the movement as well as that a printer and, when connected to a magic lantern, a projector. About the same size of an ordinary hand held still camera, the Cinématographe differed from the Kinetoscope in many ways such as the size and the weight of it. 

Qouted from - earlycinema.com-

http://www.earlycinema.com/technology/cinematographe.html

Was said that, Lumière brothers used 35mm film but unlike Edison opted for a film speed of 16 fps as opposed to the 46 fps chosen by Edison.

The silent era of animation 

In 1900 the silent er became something new for the viewers. 

Its an early mainstream animation known to man lasting from the early 1900s.till the 1920s

Emile Cohl also known as the father of animated cartoon. 

A short stop-motion animation was produced in 1908 by Albert E smith and J. Stuart Blackton called The Humpty Dumpty made by stop motion which is a technique in which real objects are moved around in the time between their images being recorded.
This included Gertie the Dinosaur invented in 1914. However, the first big cartoon star was Felix the Cat in 1919. 
which then came Koko the clown and Bimbo the dog.
In early 1923, animator Walt Disney created a short film entitled Alice's wonderland, which featured actress Virginia Davis interacting with animated characters.

Disney 

Disney was founded in October 1923 by Walt Disney and Roy. o Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon studios. 
The company also operated under the names The Walt Disney Studio, then Walt Disney Productions. Taking on its current name in 1986.


http://www.cgmantra.in/blog/the-silent-era-of-animation.html

http://courses.ncssm.edu/gallery/collections/toys/html/exhibit06.htm