Rob Swimming

Pixilation Animation

Today we did a pixilation animation in the classroom.

Pixilation is a form of animation were people move around on screen but not in the usual way like a video.
It works in the same way as most other animation, pictures or "frames" are played back at a certain speed, for example 12 frames a second this tricks the brain into seeing movement.

It is a form of stop motion animation, stop motion is often used to make inanimate objects move around like they are alive.

This one is set at 12 frames per second, which means that they are 12 frames for every second, if we were doing an actual project, we would take it up to 30 frames per second.

We exported it as a MOV as this is a good format to upload to youtube.

I am uploading it to my college youtube account so that I can post it on my blog as it allows you to embed video.

Here is the video that we made:

Animation in Television in the 1950s to 1970s

Animation in Television in the 1950s to 1970s

Hanna Barbera

Hanna Barbera was an American animation studio that was incredibly popular in North America for around three decades, the company was originally founded in 1957, and created series such as, Top cat, The Jetsons, The Hair Bear Bunch, Wacky Racers, but they started it all with The Flintstones.

Here is the intro to The Wacky Racers:

Looney Tunes

The Looney Tunes was created by Warner Bros, it's first official release was in the 1930s but really caught on in the 1950s with the introduction of the Television.

The series contains some of the most well known cartoon characters in history, such as Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig and Tweety Bird.

Here is one of the episodes staring Daffy Duck:

Oliver Postgate

Oliver Postgate was a British writer and puppeteer of some of the most popular children's shows in the UK, he created shows such as Pigwings, Pogles and Bagpuss.

Here is the intro to Bagpuss:

Creature Feature

"Creature Features" were incredibly popular in the 1950s, they were movies often involving large monsters made using animation and various other techniques. One of the most popular ones is Godzilla,  who became a pop-culture icon, featureing in many other films after that.

Here is a the trailer for the 1954 Godzilla :

Animation - 1930 - 50s

I have been asked to talk about the different styles and techniques used in animation during the 1930s to 50s, people were still experimenting with different animation styles and techniques.

To start with I was asked to look into Normal McLaren, a canadian animator who did lots of experimental work with film reels to create some rather abstract films. 

This one he made by drawing onto the film, he then made music to go over it afterwards.

Secondly there is a stop motion animation made with clay characters called Gumby, it was made by moving the figures a very small amount, and taking a new picture each time. Gumby was a popular television show. Here is a clip made as a pitch to a TV network before Gumby was made.

Tom and Jerry is a very popular cartoon series created by William Hanna and Joseph Berbera, back around 1940. It was made by drawing each frame individually.

Betty Boop, created by Max Fleischer in 1930

Three early animators

Three early animators

Georges Méliès

I have been told to look into three early animators, first of which is George Melies, he was a french illusionist and film maker who pioneered a lot of technical and narrative developments in cinema.

He accidentally discovered substitution stop trick, which is when something seemingly disappears and reappears somewhere else in the scene. 

His most famous works are "Trip to the moon" which involves some people creating and traveling in a space ship to the moon, and then exploring it, and the other was "The Impossible Voyage", both of which involve some sort of space travel, and are considered some of the earliest sifi films, though they can seem more like fantasy.

Here is an example of his work:

Winsor McCay

 

Winsor McCay was an American cartoonist and animator, who was most famous for his comic Little Nemo. His work outshone his contemporaries, and set the standard for animation followed by Walt Disney and others in later decades.

He is most famous for his animation called "Gertie the Dinosaur" which was about a dinosaur that he would give commands to, it is considered the first original character with personality created for an animation, as she would follow commands, disobey them, cry when she was scolded and even give Winsor a ride on her back when he steps into the animation.

Here is a video of Gertie the Dinosaur:

Lotte Reiniger

Lotte Reiniger was a silhouette animator and film director, she created short movies using puppets.

One of her most famous animations is called "The Adventures of Prince Achmed" which was made with cutouts of cardboard and thin sheets. 

The plot is that with the help of Aladdin, The fairy of fiery mountain and a magic horse, the title character reclaims the magic lamp and concours the African sorcerer. 

Here it is bellow:

Persistence of vision

Persistence of vision

Persistence of vision is the theory that your eyes keeps the image your eye has captured for half a second, this means that everything we see is a suitable blend of everything we see now and everything we see fractions of a second ago, this can explain the blurry vision people see when something is moving fast.

Example of persistence of vision.

A Zoetrope is an example of persistence of vision, this is because it is a series of images in a circle, inside a cardboard circle with slots cut into it, the idea is that you look through the slits and spin the circle, because of the speed in which you see the pictures spin around, it appears as if the image is movie, this could be because of persistence of vision.

Here is an example.

Fighting Stop motion! :D

Fighting Stop Motion

Me, Jacob and Lewis worked together on this stop motion of two figures fighting.