Stop Motion/Toy photography Thread

[solace97]

Gonna start a thread for any alien/predator stop motion films. (Or other genres if you want)

Here's a little test I was working on...none of the footage is edited, it's all raw from Dragonframe, I just wanted to test out some Adobe AE features...pixel motion blur helps to blend the frames and give it the appearance of smoother movement (from my understanding) and then another cool feature I found was time warp...basically you can stretch out your animation without the individual frames moving robotic

Here's a little background for my own stop motions: (condensed with spoiler tag)

Spoiler

I used Sony Vegas and Dragonframe for years but haven't animated in a long time. Looking to get back into it.

My passion project right now is to make a full length Alien and Predator stop motion...eventually an AVP one too.

I plan on using 1/12 scale figures and I've been building up an arsenal of knowledge at the moment...slowly starting to put that to practice.

My goal is to make a stop motion film you can watch and not feel like it's just toys moving around...so I'm looking to make the 1/12 human characters have realistic clothing, hair, use AI and other effects in Adobe to have the characters have facial expressions and eye movement.

I'm trying to be all practical, even when it comes to making the planets, I've found some really inexpensive ways to make "gas giant" planets out of milk and food coloring lol.

Anyways It's going to take some time and I'm new to adobe and customizing figures like this so I have a long LONG road ahead of me...but I'll post my stuff in this thread.

[close]

But with that being said post any and every stop motion you find or like! I love watching them!

Same goes for toy photography!!!

[solace97]

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DAVbGpvRbEf/?igsh=MTh1NnMwNmR2YXh2eA==https://www.instagram.com/reel/DAVbGpvRbEf/?igsh=MTh1NnMwNmR2YXh2eA==

A beautiful custom Alien warrior. Seriously amazing paint work

[Prez]

Gonna start a thread for any alien/predator stop motion films. (Or other genres if you want)

Here's a little test I was working on...none of the footage is edited, it's all raw from Dragonframe, I just wanted to test out some Adobe AE features...pixel motion blur helps to blend the frames and give it the appearance of smoother movement (from my understanding) and then another cool feature I found was time warp...basically you can stretch out your animation without the individual frames moving robotic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlB94b7w92U

Here's a little background for my own stop motions: (condensed with spoiler tag)

Spoiler

I used Sony Vegas and Dragonframe for years but haven't animated in a long time. Looking to get back into it.

My passion project right now is to make a full length Alien and Predator stop motion...eventually an AVP one too.

I plan on using 1/12 scale figures and I've been building up an arsenal of knowledge at the moment...slowly starting to put that to practice.

My goal is to make a stop motion film you can watch and not feel like it's just toys moving around...so I'm looking to make the 1/12 human characters have realistic clothing, hair, use AI and other effects in Adobe to have the characters have facial expressions and eye movement.

I'm trying to be all practical, even when it comes to making the planets, I've found some really inexpensive ways to make "gas giant" planets out of milk and food coloring lol.

Anyways It's going to take some time and I'm new to adobe and customizing figures like this so I have a long LONG road ahead of me...but I'll post my stuff in this thread.

[close]

But with that being said post any and every stop motion you find or like! I love watching them!

Same goes for toy photography!!!

Love this!! Keep it up. The final part of the video with the Xeno leaning up against the glass bottle for some reason reminded me of that old Tool video clip for Sober.

[solace97]

Thanks I appreciate it! It's all for fun I'm still getting use to adobe ans Mac, was always Microsoft and Sony Vegas...plus learning all the little nuances as well as animating again, so gonna take some time before I can achieve my goal

[Ops Officer Jackson]

Nice work so far, I look forward to when you start the project in earnest! You've definitely got a good eye for composition and camera movement. I thought about suggesting using AI interpolating to smooth out the frame rate, but honestly I think the lower frame rate adds to it; that archaic but evocative sensation where you know for sure something is stop-motion animated, and it really diverts the attention away from the "this is toys" aspect. I wonder if there's an AI utility that would make the figure joints less obvious?

I'm planning to get into animating with dragonframe too, though not in the realm of fan film, but perhaps I should take your lead and start out with a figure-based project instead of jumping right into making my own puppets

[solace97]

https://www.instagram.com/p/DGrQkMJRHRS/?

img_index=1&igsh=NHBhZTQwZGRrbXo1

hmmm trying to post an insta link to some Ai stuff I messed around with on a few figures. Is it showing up?

[solace97]

[

[Neila]

Better stick to your stop motion videos.
They look much better and are, above all, selvmade.

[solace97]

Better stick to your stop motion videos.
They look much better and are, above all, selvmade.

lol thanks, was still cool to mess around with and see the results. But thanks for checking it out!

I've thought about doing my normal flow and then maybe using Ai to smooth out the motions, I've heard of this, but haven't tried it.

Kinda just experimenting with anything and everything rn

[Neila]

Better stick to your stop motion videos.
They look much better and are, above all, selvmade.

lol thanks, was still cool to mess around with and see the results. But thanks for checking it out!

I've thought about doing my normal flow and then maybe using Ai to smooth out the motions, I've heard of this, but haven't tried it.

Kinda just experimenting with anything and everything rn

you have proven that you can create good stop motion films.
certainly, you can refine it with AI. It's not my place to dictate anything to you, and you said yourself that you just wanted to test it out.
Sure, everyone can do it however they want.
Personally, I just think that the use of AI in such things inhibits creativity. In a few years this could be lost entirely. AI is not a tool but a convenient replacement.
There are now complete AI songs.
We abolish ourselves.
Some people claim that the idea is creativity enough, but I can't agree at all.
There are many areas where AI is a blessing, for example in medicine.
But in the artistic field I find it out of place.
For me, art comes from skill.

Shit, I just realized that I sound like a moral apostle haha

[solace97]

Haha it's all good, most people feel that way!

The problem I'm having is I feel like stop motion, as smooth as you can make it, still has a stop motion feel.

Ai has too much of a whacky feel, and unnatural.

But ultimately if there was a way to make the flow of work easier in certain situations it would serve a good purpose I'd think.

The other half of that is with stop motion, if you can get it all smoothed out, I feel like Ai has the capability of assisting in those smaller cracks, by combing frames that aren't necessarily there to make the motion more smooth and believable.

I'm not for certain on this but that's where the experimenting will come in

[Neila]

Absolutely.
As long as it is used as a tool, for smoothing as you say, it is nothing more than a filter that film programs also use.

I mean, I don't expect us to cut the film strips with scissors again haha.

I know what you mean though. But to be honest, I like this slightly shaky stop motion technique.
It reminds me of the revolutionary days when King Kong or Ray Haaryhausen's skeletons moved across the screen.
It has its own charm.

You made the set pieces yourself too, didn't you? I think things like that are absolutely great.
It's handwork.
Someone sat down and built these things. I also like CGI effects because someone has to create them too, and with many projects there is no other option, but I'm just more interested in the handmade things.

[solace97]

Absolutely.
As long as it is used as a tool, for smoothing as you say, it is nothing more than a filter that film programs also use.

I mean, I don't expect us to cut the film strips with scissors again haha.

I know what you mean though. But to be honest, I like this slightly shaky stop motion technique.
It reminds me of the revolutionary days when King Kong or Ray Haaryhausen's skeletons moved across the screen.
It has its own charm.

You made the set pieces yourself too, didn't you? I think things like that are absolutely great.
It's handwork.
Someone sat down and built these things. I also like CGI effects because someone has to create them too, and with many projects there is no other option, but I'm just more interested in the handmade things.

yes I did! And I will always keep it that way; my goal is to one day make an alien/predator full length stop motion and have it as real looking as practical. I want people to forget they're watching toys