This project was a revelation to me in various ways. The rabbit animation group in particular had a couple of difficult boys, but also a feisty boy and a feisty girl - a potent mix of energy. They took the best part of half a lesson to settle on a plan, with lots of fooling about, noise, indecision, almost to the point of indiscipline that would have me intervening. Then they got down to work and produced an excellent animation.
The animation itself works I think because short as it is it tells a concise and full story, based on an admittedly weak joke. Little animations based on a gag format work really well. I set the gathering of jokes as a homework in preparation for this project.
I was impressed by the camera movement, the zooms.
Lip sync is another possibility for the Roehampton day, using faces cut from magazines, or taking photographs with differing mouth shapes to print, collage and photograph.
In preparation for this day I shall be updating my list of software. When I start using new software I make a brief note about what it is, what it does, and how I am using it. This regularly makes me a sure bet for receiving free licences from companies that want their software promoted. I will also provide delegates with lists of web links - my beach combings.
I have just discovered that there is a new version of iStopmotion, which includes a feature for lip sync whereby you can record a bit of film of someone talking, load this into the project, and have the animation mimic the mouth shapes. Very cool. I instantly wrote to them asking for a licence so that I can play with this feature in advance of the conference. But I am more likely to go with the possibilities of freely downloadable animation software like Pencil and iChalk for Mac, and Monkeyjam for PC.
My daughter and I watched Tim Burton's Corpse Bride last night. In doing a bit of reading up on this, I discovered that it had all been filmed on digital still cameras - ordinary Canon SLR's, which apparently provided a better image quality than film.