Category: General


  • watching strider’s skulkin ani…

    watching strider’s skulkin animation test http://darkmattr.blogspot.com/


  • watching http://tinyurl.com/br…

    watching http://tinyurl.com/brg4tr


  • @wefollow #stopmotion #animati…

    @wefollow #stopmotion #animation #film


  • aardman has a youtube channel!…

    aardman has a youtube channel! http://www.youtube.com/user/aardman


  • specifically…http://tinyurl….

    specifically… http://tinyurl.com/2dkzmd


  • sita releases under creative c…

    sita releases under creative commons! http://www.sitasingstheblues.com/


  • watching http://vimeo.com/3388…

    watching http://vimeo.com/3388129


  • postmodern is replaced by alte…

    postmodern is replaced by altermodern… http://tinyurl.com/by5o38


  • Yep…Breathe, Unknown Caller,…

    Yep…Breathe, Unknown Caller, and Magnificent are about the finest things I’ve heard from Bono and Co. since the Achtung Baby days!


  • So…i do like the new U2 albu…

    So…i do like the new U2 album…lots of subtle Eno sprinkled throughout…sometimes very Eno!


  • subscribing to the john cleese…

    subscribing to the john cleese podcast http://www.johncleesepodcast.co.uk/cleeseblog/


  • test driving the new U2 album …

    test driving the new U2 album on myspace http://www.myspace.com/u2


  • watching… http://tinyurl.com…

    watching… http://tinyurl.com/cpvw9v


  • this may be kind of important …

    this may be kind of important for indie film creators http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/12757


  • @Sven hi sven, are you talking…

    @Sven hi sven, are you talking about this? http://tinyurl.com/ahpkjp


  • reading about miro…the new f…

    reading about miro…the new free HD open source video player. http://www.getmiro.com/


  • @Sven Absolute Wilson is now i…

    @Sven Absolute Wilson is now in my queue. Thx for the recommendation Sven!


  • my new fav band. why doesn’t s…

    my new fav band. why doesn’t stuff like this win a grammy? http://tinyurl.com/4jm5up


  • really liking the latest album…

    really liking the latest album by “elbow”!


  • Show me your movie poster…

    I decided to do a quick post of independent stopmotion animator projects with movie poster style marketing images. Send links for your project’s movie poster or others that I may have missed. My general rule for posting these is that the image has to take the form of your typical movie poster, teaser poster, or…


  • 3D Stereo Photography Test

    Inspired by Isomer’s 3D clips on youtube and his thread on the SMA forum I made a quick pick to test 3D. I used my home-made dolly and move the camera 1 inch for the second photo. I also added the white dots since that helps me (an maybe others) to converge the two images…


  • 2008 Independent Animation Review

    Really cool animation-related news that took place in 2008. Karl finished My Uncle’s Dental Health. Congrats Karl! I’m very much looking forward to his latest project (using binder clips – brilliant IMO) called Saint Ignatius the Beneficent. Justin and Shel finished Gerald’s Last Day. Can’t wait to see it since they get a gold star…


  • Tesseracting: Gabriel Shalom’s Hypercubist Cinema

    After watching a pretty amazing Adobe R&D video on vimeo, I browsed through the comments and stumbled upon this: “There is totally a better word: Tesseracting. Because what you are developing at Adobe is a prototypical system for frameless, hypercubist cinema. I write a blog on the future of cinema and your tool fits nicely…


  • Semantic Structures and Storytelling 2.0

    I found another post on the web about the impact, or influence, of technology in filmmaking, videomaking, and animating. In this case it is the ideas borrowed from the semantic web that could be used to enhance traditional narrative structures and possibly change the way people consume-create media. This approach lends to the portability of…


  • Story Cubes

    I made some story cubes over the weekend as a creative project. Story cubes seem to be used for brainstorming stories or narrative content. You roll them out and based on the icons that are showing formulate some kind of story. Since they are physical blocks it adds a tactile quality to the activity which…


  • Filmaking 2.0, Content and Metadata

    In my previous post I was pondering the impact of technologies on content in film-video productions. While searching for more examples of emergent or disruptive ideas regarding film-video making I ran across the Future of Cinema Debate on YouTube. It’s worth a watch, specifically for the ideas offered by Arin Crumley on the idea of…


  • Technology, Innovation, and the Future of Animation

    I’ve recently come upon three separate quotes that, to me, speak to the need for animators to continually strive to innovate with their work in regard to contemporary creative technologies. Using a digital camera, and working from an NLE or animating in Flash or After Effects is using modern technology…but is not in itself innovative. I’m…


  • VITRVVIVS Time Spent in Post-Production

    While backing up my VITRVVIVS files I reflected on my Sony Vegas file naming convention. The file names are listed below to illustrate the incremental numbering for each session so I can rollback if something goes wrong: VIT-EDIT-FINALCUT-01.veg VIT-EDIT-FINALCUT-02.veg VIT-EDIT-FINALCUT-03.veg What this means is, with the date modified system info as well as my file…


  • That’s a wrap! VITRVVIVS is done.

    Festival Entry Specifications Title: VITRVVIVS Running Time: Approximately 17 min 35 sec Format: DVD, NTSC, LETTERBOX, COLOR, STEREO Language: Esperanto Subtitles: English Date Completed: September 2008 Now that the film is completed I am burning DVDs to send to a few festivals. I have plans for a future official DVD release which will have a…


  • View the Vitruvius video…sort of

    I captured my editor workspace tonight and this is what it looks like. That’s the whole film across the top…about 17 minutes at this point but that may change. I think screen caps of editing workspaces from other animators would be interesting. I may have to check flickr to see if there is a pool…


  • General Update

    Time for an update: started playing with twitter making progress on the score for Vitruvius updated my blog with a new theme reinstalled last.fm catching up on Lars von Trier films via Netflix…fantastic


  • Test Video Footage for Upcoming Projects Part 1

    In addition to making tiny steps toward the completion of Vitruvius I’ve also started pre-production on some other projects. Part of the process is getting familiar with the HV20 and further development of the sets. Doing these tests help determine composition and lighting but instead of just taking a single photograph I animate several seconds…


  • Ticks Fundraising Event

    In local news… Justin Curfman, a local animator, is putting together a fundraising and networking event on June 7, 2008 to support the creation of his next stopmotion film called “Ticks”. View the Ticks teaser trailer and other videos by Justin on his YouTube site.


  • Camera Dolly 2008

    Recently I read some information about camera rigs and the concepts found in model railroad designs inspired me. So, I browsed the “orange” home improvement store and found some items to build a dolly over the weekend. All photos are on the Flickr site (click the photo to see them). You can probably get the…


  • Audio: Mixing and Mastering Tips

    I have a printed copy of some info attributed to a Ron (aka RF) from the Fantomized web site [around April 2004] but I can no longer find the information online. [UPDATE: the info appears to be located here: http://forums.rolandclan.com/viewtopic.php?t=2735&p=19561 ] So I’m reproducing it here along with my visual representation of the grid he…


  • Index Card Exercise (Follow Up to Starewicz Post)

    Ok, so I’m done with the exercise. Here is a photo of the final board. I forgot to mention in the previous post to work the exercise quickly…do not over analyze anything…it’s more stream of consciousness in that respect I suppose. Just go with the ideas that come to mind as disjointed as they may…


  • Starewicz as a Benchmark for Planning Animation Storyboards

    Some time ago I posted my analysis of “The Frogs Who Wanted a King” by Wladyslaw Starewicz on stopmotionanimation.com as a benchmark for developing shots and scenes. I am running through the exercise for my next project tonight as I draft storyboard cards so I thought I would re-post the info here at my blog.…


  • Vitruvius Update: February 2008

    No Serlio, we are not done yet. I have finally got all the footage in order with a couple of proxy files [apparently that is the acceptable term for what I described previously] for editing in Vegas. The main sections of music have been recorded. Audio tracks and foley/effects work still remain. Another facet of…


  • MonoMyth

    Well, while brainstorming ideas for future projects and researching things on the web I came across the MonoMyth site. What I like most though is the interactive MonoMyth creator and also the preset MonoMyths of some films to help illustrate the concept. UPDATE: Actually it’s only sort-of-nice. I thought it would let me create a…


  • 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…


  • 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…


  • 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…


  • 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…


  • 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.


  • Death of a Matriarch

    Takuro Masuda, a filmmaker and stopmotion animator in Atlanta, has posted his animation “Death of a Matriarch” on YouTube. The film was made for the Center for Puppetry Arts XPT series.


  • Vitruvius: Quick Update

    I have all but finished the filming for Vitruvius except for some pick-up shots. There is one more sequence to shoot and then I’ll be taking a break during most of July and August before starting post-production. During the fall I’ll begin editing and working on post-production effects as well as revisiting the audio portions…


  • A Day in the Life…Move Puppet, Click, Repeat

    Forty years ago today Sgt. Pepper was released. My favorite tracks are Getting Better, Lovely Rita, and A Day in the Life. The album is going to be on repeat as my background music when I work on Vitruvius later today. I think Justin and Shel may put videos on in the background when animating.…


  • Armature Test Clip 2

    I did another test tonight. I am thinking that this armature is a bit unstable and has some spring to it compared to a wire armature secured with epoxy putty. I may have to make an epoxy version of the same proportions and try similar tests to confirm which is more stable for movement. WATCH…


  • Armature Test Clip

    I filmed a quick test tonight using my recent armature design. Here is the result: WATCH MOVIE


  • New Studio Setup

    I’m hoping to get back into production on the Vitruvius film in April. I’ve started to re-build my sets in my new studio. The following picture captures my carts and stages better than previous photos.