The History and Development of Stop Motion animation

There are many different kind of animation based toys, the first being the thaumatrope. This is a piece of card with an image on both sides and a piece of string on the edges. The toy is spun using the strings, displaying the images on either side. This gives the impression that both images are merged, due to persistence of vision.

For mine, I drew a dancer and a stage, so when the toy is spun, it looks as if she is performing. I feel like this one went well.

A Zoetrope is a small circle of plastic with raised sides, like a wheel. These sides have slits in them. An image is create on a long strip of paper, with around 8 small images all displaying one ongoing action. When they're spun in this toy it looks like one perpetual motion. This is why the images must loop back round, with the last following into the first. It's similar to a modern day GIF file.
For mine, I drew a person having an idea and then losing it, so when it is played together it looks like he's thinking. My only problem with this one is that the person does not look exactly accurate every time, as I didn't fully plan out each slide.

A Praxinoscope is  similar to a zoetrope, but is a spinning wheel with mirrors. The image strip is placed onto the base and is reflected in the mirrors. This again gives the idea that they are moving as, when it spins, the mirror stays in one place displaying the pictures.
For mine, I drew someone with a hula hoop. This worked well, but didn't perfectly loop back as it should have done.

The explanation behind all of these is 'The Persistence of Vision', this relates to a theory about how our eyes remember images for a few seconds after we've seen them. This explains how these toys work, as our vision will 'remember' the first image as it sees the next, and will mistake them as being together.

There are many pioneers of Stop motion animation, both old fashioned and modern.

Aardman, the company behind Wallace and Gromit, work particularly with Plasticine based models, Their work focuses mainly on the way their characters are animated.

PIONEERS OF ANIMATION

George Pal worked with puppets and time lapses, creating short films that were . He is behind the films 'The Time Machine' and 'The War of the Worlds'.

This clip shows the time lapse photography and stop motion used in the Time travel scene.



Ray Harryhausen found his fame in creating prehistoric films and the research of Dynamation. His most famous film was 'Jason and the Argonauts', which featured early stop motion footage of a variety of creatures made from clay, such as skeletons and a moving statue.



Phil Tippet specialises in Stop motion and visual effects, he worked on many of the scenes in Jurassic Park and the Star Wars films


Tim Burton and Henry Sellick work using very detailed puppets and small models. they are well known for their abstract and usually creepy style of film. Most famously, they created 'The Nightmare before Christmas' which was entirely stop motion.

Adam Shaheen is the founder and executive producer for Cuppa Coffee, working on over 200 adverts.

The brothers Quay create their film using inorganic items such as dolls or screws, using disassembled and rearranged. The style of their films is unusual and relies heavily on music without much dialogue.






There are several children's TV shows that use stop motion animation, with a variety of different types.  One that is very well known is Postman Pat, which has been around since 1981. It uses small models with realistic hair and clothing in a colourful 3D setting.




A more adult take on Stop Motion animation is Wallace and Gromit, created by the Aardman company, which is noticeable by it's rougher designs and the fact that immense detail is paid to background and small movement such as eyes.

Paranorman is a more recent example of a stop motion children's film .I've chosen this example of this style as. although this film has a much more mature theme behind it, it did very well amongst younger audiences and featured themes relating heavily to school life.


In the Star Wars Films, a small amount of the battle scenes in the Empire Strikes back were animated using Stop Motion. Most noticeably the AT-AT's in the Hoth Battle.



These were adverts created by the Aardman company, featuring small plasticine people to show ideas about fitness and healthy eating.


Creature Comforts was a series of adverts that aimed to teach lessons about safety or insurance. It features model animals and contains strong voice acting to bring in the humour.

In the Spice Girls Music Video 'Viva Forever' there is a section which features fairy like versions of the band members. These were small models created from tin and the short section took months to make.