Objects At Rest

explorations in audio and moving imagery

Category: Animation

  • Vitruvius Project Update

    Slowly I am getting back into the Vitruvius project. Most of the puppet filming is done and now begins the task of creating the assets for post-production compositing. The Flash animation below is a test for the various line drawings that are planned for the film.

    The idea is to export animations such as this (running at 24fps) as image sequences for compositing with the stopmotion footage.

    In addition to the line drawing animations, I have been assembling portions of the Latin and Italian texts of Vitruvius and Serlio for the script. Finally, I will be revisiting the audio portions of the project including the music score in early 2008.

  • Armature 2008 – Tie Downs – UPDATED

    Update. I took another pair of carved shoes to try a modified design of the wire and brass nut. This time I wrapped the wire around the groove on the outside of the brass nut (see original posting below for context). I then placed the nut in a hole at the toe (instead of in the ankle) and curved the wire up through the ankle hole in the shoe. The idea is to allow for more flexibility of the wire at the ankle so it may not break as easily under repeated bending. My wire and brass nut are now similar to what Sven and Mike have done. I posted some pics of the new shoe:

    photo

    What may be different is that I am not permanently fixing the foot/shoe to the nut. The intent is for the design to allow me to have replacement armature parts, specifically wire. If my leg segment breaks I want to be able to swap out the wire and continue to use the shoe and possibly the brass nut. Hopefully this will allow me to do so since the brass nut and wire fit securely into the bottom of the shoe and I used hot glue (which I can release if needed) to hold it in place. In short, I can take the shoe off at any time.

    End of update, the original posting follows..

    I’ve been working on some tests for the armatures to be used in the next project. My design may not be original but I’m combining information from other stop motion animator blogs regarding tie-downs. I used the Hilligoss T-Shaped tie down for Vitruvius but this time I wanted to try something else. My new tie-downs are inspired by tips found in the blog archives of Mike and Sven and possibly other places that I can’t remember right now. For example, J-B Weld is the adhesive (Mike has mentioned that at one point) and the knurled brass nuts are placed in the foot (Sven posted something about those recently). I put the pics up on Flickr with notes and descriptions so go check them out if you like.

  • International Animation Day Recap

    October 29, 2007 was International Animation Day. The Atlanta Chapter of ASIFA screened 21 films at the High Museum of Art.

    In 2002, ASIFA, the International Animated Film Association, launched a global event to celebrate the art of animation. October 28th was proclaimed as International Animation Day, commemorating the first public performance of Emile Reynaud¹s Theatre Optique at the Grevin Museum in Paris in 1892. Each year, ASIFA groups around the world celebrate International Animation Day. In 2006 51 different countries in all the continents celebrated this day. – Source: ASIFA

    Apparently, all the ASIFA chapters around the world compile their local films on a DVD and send them out to the rest of the chapters. Each chapter then selects the films they want to show for their screening. The Atlanta screening contained films from Estonia, Bulgaria, Australia, Korea, Israel, Iran, and Hungary. The screening at the museum was great and I hope they are able to continue that partnership for this event. The turnout seemed pretty good and the films were great.

    For now I can’t find a web site with the Atlanta Listing for direct links to my favorite films (other than the link available above which you have to search through). Maybe updates will be posted in the future.

  • UPDATE PART 2 – Philips Webcam vs Zigview S2

    Breaking news! Nellybob has posted a complete solution on Stopmotionanimation.com for using the Philips with a DSLR camera. He has addressed the specific issues I had with the webcam and attaching it to the camera and it looks really good. The only issues that remain for me at this are specific PC config problems for the cam. I may be doing a second look at the Philips once I resolve my PC/USB issues. Thank you Nellybob!

    —-ORIGINAL POST FOLLOWS—-

    There have been some posts at the stopmotionanimation.com forum about the new Philips SPC900NC webcam. The specs looked good for use as a video assist so I got my hands on one and did some quick tests. Here are some side by side shots of the Philips and the Zigview (click on the pics for the full resolution version which shows the size and quality of what I’m seeing on my monitor in my screen cap software).

    pic

    pic

    The shot is lit with incandescent bulbs, one 60 watt and one 20 watt fill with a desk light on the other side of the room. The Philips pics are darker (to me it looks more natural and similar to what I’m seeing through the Nikon viewfinder) but keep in mind that I did not adjust the image settings very much. I could boost the brightness and contrast on the Philips if needed. The Zigview, as far as I know, doesn’t offer these subtle controls outside of the on screen menus.

    I’ve had white colors blowing out the picture in the Zig when animating so the Philips would work better in those situations. To me they are both about the same quality…blurry…but the Philips costs hundreds less and with the option to go 30fps or greater the picture appears smoother. The Zig has noise in the image like a cloud of mosquitoes compared to the Philips. Also, I have to plug the Zigview up to the electrical outlet since the battery life isn’t long but the Philips is USB powered which means less cords and electricity.

    I used the digital zoom to get the Philips image to fill the screen but the Zigview is running at the default. Considering the zoom and the small size of the viewfinder the Philips is doing a pretty good job. I’ll need to test it some more.

    UPDATE

    I did some testing with the Philips in my animation workflow and ran into some problems.

    • The Philips knocked out my ability to run my external USB sound card
    • The USB capture from my Nikon and the Philips USB didn’t get along well — it slowed my system down to a stop
    • My screen grab software started becoming unresponsive
    • My Zigview runs without any problems and all other systems are unaffected by the Zigview.

    I suspect most of the problems are related more to my system than to the Philips but I’ll be sticking with the Zigview for the time being since I need to finish my animation instead of troubleshooting PC configurations.

  • Moh! Stop… and Check Out Monster Month Blogs

    It is fitting for the Halloween season to visit sites with illustrations of fantastic beasts. Monster Month and Monster Month South are two primary resources to check out.

    pic

    pic