Hi,
My Brother has started making Stop Motion shorts but he has encountered a few problems. He is using old WWF figures and Action Man (Like G.I Joe) figures to animate but he can't seem to make them stand up unattended, does any one know how to animate toys without them falling over every time you move them?
Thanks,
Yep. It happens every now and then. I've found that colored thread works too, but you have to coordinate it with the color of your backgrounds to get the best inviso-effect. :(
Bwahahahah!! :eek: That's a good one! I think I'll try that one out on my next stop-mo project and see if it works or if it's just an urban legend.
Thanks man, that post really brightened my day! :D
Well, I doubt it's an urban legend, since I got it directly from the source at a presentation about C-H's work methods. Your mileage may vary, of course.
Eh, couldn't come up with a more concise method of referring to the possible problems that this solution might cause other than saying 'urban legend'. I.e.: how do you keep the model from moving, what kind of "female pleasure device" should you use, should it have with multiple settings or is a COTS device okay, does the size matter, how do you handle multiple threads on the model or multiple models for that matter, do you have someone standing off camera holding the device to the thread or is it propped up... It sounds ingenious if it works, but also sounds pretty out there as far as solutions go. Wonder how they figured it out? Someone with a degree in physics or someone with a dirty mind and LOTS of time on their hands...
Not surprisingly, they didn't go into too many details. :D The discussion was centered around their production of a stop-mo TV series for BBC called Lavender Castle, and they were talking about some of the cheats they use to get the production done on time and on budget - magnets for tiedowns, this flying rig tip, etc.
They did say that it is hand-held, and the application of the device should be close to the flying rig, away from the model. IMS, this positioning blurs the line without undue vibrations finding their way into the model itself.
I do know I'd pay money to see the look on the clerk's face when someone shows up at the counter of their local adult emporium with an armload of these things and the explanation for such a large purchase - "I don't know which one will make my puppet's strings disappear..." :D
And see, now, I was trying to get the picture out of my head where they had a rig set up to handle multiple strings. You'd probably have to do a noise reduction pass on the footage. ;)
Depending on how he's recording the imagery, he could either prop them up from a point in space obstructed by the characters themselves (Say they're in profile being shot so that we can see the right side of their body, you'd use something that their actual body would block, coming in from the left side of their body)...or if he's recording them as still images onto the computer there's always using your hands and erasing them against an empty background plate of the original set (using separate layers in a tool like Photoshop).
Get some of that sticky putty stuff people use to keep things in place on a shelf - every hardware store carries it. A little of that on the bottom of the character's foot works wonders.
A more professional solution would use screws through the bottom of the set or rare-earth magnets on both the character's foot and under the set floor, but that's a bit more involved.
Yah, or you could be smart and do what he said =)
And he writes properly too. Let me go edit what I said.
Another trick is to build a small framework around your set (looks like a swingset or even a box frame) that is off camera. Take fishing line and tie one end around the figure then the other end around a washer or some other small object that weighs as much as the figure. Then you place the line up and over the framework and position your figure so that the weight suspends the figure in its place. A little more effort, but if you aren't allowed to drill through the table... :D
But then you have the problem of the fishing line catching light and showing up in the shot. A while back, I picked up a trick for how to make those invisible from a stop-mo animator from Cosgrove-Hall.
Turns out that when they fly their characters with fishing line, they touch an, um, electric female gratification device to the line at a point out of frame. The vibration is just enough to keep the line from showing up in the shot, but not enough to jostle the character.
Animators are nothing if not innovative... :)