TheVirtualInstructor Blog

It’s been a couple of weeks since I’ve been able to post, so I figured that I would share with you a project that I’ve been working on with my students.  One of the classes that I teach is Animation.  Each quarter, our focus in this class is on a different type of animation.  For example, 1st quarter, we concentrate on traditional frame by frame animation, 2nd quarter- Stop Motion, 3rd quarter- Rotoscoping and then 4th quarter students create a lengthy 5 min film.  Stop Motion animation is currently the focus of this class.  The dilemma for me as the teacher lies in the fact that most stop motion work relies on the students taking their own photos out of class, leaving “down time” for students in class.  So this year, I decided to include a little video game development. We could develop our video games in class and the students could develop their stop motion projects mostly outside of class time.  I realized that this would be a challenge for me, since this is relatively uncharted territory for most students.  It also includes quite a bit of coding with action script in Adobe Flash.  Well, this class has really flourished with the video game design.  The students are enthralled in their activities and are creating some pretty amazing video games.  As you might imagine, I get lots of questions.  Students sign up at the beginning of class and I work my way down the list, helping each student in order.  In the near future, I hope to post a video tutorial explaining the process of creating a basic video game in Adobe Flash.  I modified the basic game that I made as a demonstration to the students to reflect the season.  It’s called “Santa vs Aliens” You can check it by clicking on the screen shot below…

Maybe you’re like many of us in the Art world that have admired the realm of animation, but were always put off by the inherent technical apsects that often seem like a mystery.  Or maybe your excuse not try animation was that the equipment needed to create it was either too complex to learn, or too expensive to buy.   Or maybe you’re an art teacher that always wanted to try  and do animation with your students, but you felt like your lack of experience or resources made it impossible.  Well, kiss all of those excuses “good-bye”, and consider stop motion animation.

Stop motion animation has been around since the creation of early movies.  This type of animation is created by taking photographs within a sequence and playing that sequence of photographs at a high “frame rate”.  In each photograph that is taken, the object that “moves” is placed in a slightly different location.  When the photos are played in order, the object that was photographed, appears to move naturally.  Stop motion animation is used to create all kinds of creative animations.  Just do a quick search on Youtube.com for “stop motion” and you’ll see what I mean. 

Using stop motion is a great way to introduce yourself or students to the world of animation.  It can be a fun and creative project to do on your own or with a class of students.  It doesn’t require any fancy equipment, or advanced degrees in animation.  You can create stop motion films with just a camera and some free programs that you can download.

When I am teaching animation to my students, we use Adobe Flash.  Adobe Flash is not a free program but you can download a trial version for free here->Adobe Flash Download

Here is a short list of some free stop motion programs…

MonkeyJam - “What’s MonkeyJam?
MonkeyJam is a digital penciltest program. It is designed to let you capture images from a webcam, camcorder, or scanner and assemble them as separate frames of an animation. You can also import images and sound files already on your computer. Although it is designed for pencil and paper, MonkeyJam can also be used for StopMotion animation and has several features just for that. Movies created in MonkeyJam can be exported as AVI files.”
-From MonkeyJam Website

StopMotion Pro- Professional Animation Program that features a free trial.

Animator DV Simple- Use this free software to create stop motion films with your webcam.

iKITmovie- Animation software that includes lots of sounds.  The website features lots of examples that people have made and includes a free trial version. 

If you know of any others, please comment and share.

Creating a growing animation in Adobe Flash CS4 is easier than you think.  I’m not talking about just using a tween.  If you create a masking layer, you can make your animation grow like a real plant would-from the ground up and then out.  First, you will need to either create a vector image in Adobe Illustrator CS4 or draw your image in Adobe Flash CS4.  If you create the image in Illustrator, import it into your Flash library and then pull it onto your stage.  If you draw it in Flash then it is already on your stage.  Name this layer, “mask”.  Create a new layer.  Name the new layer, “artwork”, as this layer will hold the actual marks.  Pull the “mask” layer to the top of the layer order so that the “artwork” layer is directly below it.  Now right click on the “mask” layer and select the word “mask” from the menu.  Unlock both of the layers to see the art.  Click on the outline box on the “mask” layer.  Go to the “artwork” layer and make a mark where you want your animation to begin.  Hit the “F6″ key to go to the next frame and draw a little more. It’s okay if your marks go beyond the mask.  These marks won’t be seen in the final animation.  Continue drawing within the masking lines on the “artwork” layer and hitting the “F6″ key until the entire mask is filled.  Export your animation and enjoy the show.

To see the video demonstration of  this lesson click here-> Create a Growing Animation in Flash