26/Sep/2022 - 28/Nov/2022 (Week 5 - Week 14)
Kim MinJoon (0353248)
Bachelor of Design (Honours) in Creative Media / VSP60104 / Taylor's
University
Final Project: Stop Motion or Visual Effects
**3 Stop Motion Animations or Visual Effects Videos**
For the final project, we had 2 choices of going with either visual effects
or stop-motion. I wanted to do animation for my specialization so I just
went with stop-motion for the final project.
Mr Martin has explained to us that we need to make a awareness type of
video or if we had a better idea in mind, we could just do that
instead.
I had an idea of a clay animation being kidnapped by an ice cream truck but that idea was kind of scrapped as it was a little too hard to do. The ice cream truck would've need to be stable and the back needed to open for my story to work but of course, since its clay, I couldn't do that.
So, i just though of a kid that was just playing in a playground or whatever with its ball, and then the ball just gets bounced off onto a road. The kid tries to follow the ball and when he grabs the ball, a car hits him and the car tumbles along the road as well.
But I think this was a bit too serious and I didn't really want it to be too serious as it will be boring. So I decided to make things a bit more interesting with the graphics that I can put when editing everything.
First, with the clay that I got, I made a character that was very simple. Then with some of the tools and resources that I got from my friends, I started shooting my stop-motion video. This was done in campus so the lighting was a tad bit inconsistent. everything was going okay for the shoot. I also realized that since the frame rates are going to be pretty much the same, when anything is going fast, it needs to move more frame by frame or else it will look like it is moving incredibly slow.
So then, when I was done with the shooting, it was time for me to edit the video. From the exercise class that we had about the stop-motion filming, Mr Martin showed us how to import the photos into after effects and do it from there. So I followed his instructions and I got it to work. I changed the frame rate and everything, but the object in the photos like the stands that is holding the characters in the sky, needed to be edited.
Mr Martin showed us how to remove them one by one in class, but since the lighting and everything was quite inconsistent, the masking in after effects was horrible and it just looked awful. So I made the decision to edit all of the photos one by one in photoshop.
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| Figure 1.1: After Effects Masking |
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| Figure 1.2: After Effect Masking done |
I used the clone stamp tool, copy pasting from another photo, and etc.
After everything was done, it was a lot better and more smooth. The camera angle wasn't the best but it was okay. Then, when it was time to add in the audio, I exported the video from after effects then imported it back onto premiere pro. I downloaded some effects like an explosion, alien effect and etc.
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| Figure 1.6: Explosion effect downloaded |
When it came to acting out the voices for the kid, I made sure to use my own voice and the methods I used for the audio dubbing class. I also used OBS studio to record a sound effect from the original Japanese series Doraemon since Doraemon made an appearance in the stop-motion as well.
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| Figure 1.7: OBS studio recording doraemon |
Then in premiere pro, I added everything in and I duplicated some of the scenes that were necessary like the kid bouncing his ball. This was also sped up since the ball bouncing was taking too long to come back up. So I 2x the speed and duplicated it 2 more times so that the kid bounced 3 times.
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| Figure 1.8: Premiere Pro edit #1 |
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| Figure 1.9: Premiere Pro Final Edit |
Reflections
Experience
When it came to stop-motion I really didn't like it. I always knew the tedious tiring process of moving things 1 mm every frame and I wanted to go with visual effects. However, since I was going to be going into animation for my specialization, I knew I had to go into Stop-Motion. But with the help of editing, it was better than I thought it was going to be.
Observations
I really did find myself slacking and not being able to perform the best when it came to shooting. I definitely could've done better when it came to designing the story line but I was too excited for the holidays to be honest.. But I am grateful that I was able to finish this in time.
Findings
I found myself quite stuck when doing the after effects when making the composition for the stop-motion animation. The different variables like lighting, background, objects in the frame, were too much to be considered and I did not consider any of them and I knew that I was quite in a bad situation when i was editing it. There were too much differences between 2 frames and I really considered doing another shoot but since I had no time left, I just had to go with it and although I think it could've been done better, I am still quite proud of the outcome.
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