Intro - History - Special Effects
Stop
Motion is an animation technique in which the animator's work is photographing
objects, frame by frame. Between one photogram and another, the animator
changes the position of the objects just a little. When the film is projected
at 24 photograms per second, it gives the illusion that the objects are
moving.
This illusion of movement is due to a retinal persistence. When the retina
is activated by light it sends impulses to the brain, which in turn are
interpreted as images by the cerebral cortex. The cells of the retina
continue to send impulses even after the light sources is removed. This
continues for a few fractions of a second until the cells of the retina
return to normal. Meanwhile, the brain continues to receive stimulus from
retina, and these impulses remain as an image coming from the light source.
Thus, characterize the retinal persistence phenomena. For this reason,
if in this interval of the image permanence we superimpose a new figure
there is the illusion of movement.
Taking advantage of this illusion the most diverse techniques to make
an animated film were created. Stop Motion there has already been created
animations with. Stop Motion animation has also been created using cutouts,
puppets, clay, wire and other objects.
Since George
Meliés, in the early days of moving making, until today with films
like "Chicken Run" and "Star Wars" many were the animators
and the curious who adventure in Stop Motion animation. Some with more
interest, developing studies and methods of working, others just experimenting,
but everyone in one way or another contributed in perfecting this technique
which until today a awakens our curiosity and fascination.
Here is some information on the history of Stop Motion and some of its
fantastic results.
George
Meliés (1861-1938) was a great magical French illusionist who saw
the cinema as a natural extension of his art, which would bring incredible
results to his transformations, metamorphism, and mysterious tricks of
disappearance. The bases of his fantastic films were fair tales, popular
stories and Julius Verne´s sagas of science fiction. Stop Action
or Stop Motion made it possible for Meliés to create incredible
illusions as was done in one of his masterpiece "Trip to the Moon"
in 1902. He was the first to create special effects and tricks in his
films. He already used the primordial process of animation in Stop Motion:
he filmed an image, stopped the camera altered the image, filmed it again,
stop the camera and altered the new image.
Taking
advantage of popularity of cartoons and comic magazines, around the year
1897, in the United States, an English cartoonist named James Stuart Blackton,
who was considered to be the father of the American animated cinema, founded
a studio together with a magician, Albert E. Smith and a illusionist,
Ronald A. Reader. Their intentions were to produce films with talent and
creativity. The Vitagraph Studio went on to become one of the most important
of its time. The three artists also developed techniques of animation.
Blackton was the one who most experimented in this area. One of his most
important films was "The Haunted Hotel" in 1906. In this live-action
film the audience could see, for the first time a phantom knife cutting
a loaf of bread in a macabre way by itself, and many other things of this
sort.
The film was a great success. People became very curios: they could not
discover how the artists had done all that. Very simple: the objects were
filmed in various photograms but with one detail: one photogram and another,
the artist made a little change on the position of the objects. When the
film was exhibited it gave the impression that the objects were moving
by than selves. This technique became known as Stop Motion. Using this
technique stationary objects are used to create an illusion of movement.
Around
the 1905, at the same time of Blackton´s discoveries in the United
States, Spaniard Segundo de Chomón carried out experiments in animation
launched one of his most famous works: "El Hotel Eléctrico"
using Stop Motion technology. Chomón was invited to work in Paris
with the Pathé Brothers, who wanted to compete with Meliés
in the land of fantasy. Chomón´s films was similar to Blackton´s,
but the supporters of this Spanish animator gave him the title "Father
of Animation", since his film was made before Blackton´s, and
his innumerous contributions to the cinema from the first morphing in
his film "La licuefacción de los cuerpos duros" (1909)
to one of his extensive works full creativity.
The competition for the one who made the first Stop Motion movie was very
disputed. Another film animator to whom the first experiments in Stop
Motion experiments are attributed is an English man Arthur Melbourne Cooper.
In 1906, he produced "Noah´s Ark" and in 1908 "Dreams
of Toyland". The later tells the story of toys that became alive
while children slept, which became a recurring theme in animated movies.
But Cooper´s technique in filming out-of-doors produced a strange
effect in Stop Motion, because the Earth´s rotation causes flicking
shadows. He was the first one that used animation in advertising.
Meanwhile, the film crew at Vitagraph, created a naval battle, with incredible
effects by using miniatures ships made of paper, in scenario with water,
cigarettes smokes, flashes of gunpowder. It was the first time that someone
used special effects in animation of miniatures.
Émile
Cohl, who was born in Paris (1857-1938), did a little of everything. He
was good at caricatures, photography, painting and poetry. He also wrote
comedies, and was crazy about all types of tricks and magic. After having
seen Blackton´s movie "The Haunted Hotel" Cohl became
curios and tried to discover how all those techniques had been done.
Some time after (1908) he produced his first movie called "Fantasmagorie".
The movie was similar to Blackton´s, but had many more draws. In
Émile Cohl´s movies the story was told by using draws that
moved on the screen, and not tricks made by using real objects. After
his first movie he produced more than 250 animated movies in which he
experimented using everything: Stop Motion, special effects and even draws
made on the film.
In
this period the European East started to stand out in the art of animation,
especially in Stop Motion. We have great masters of this technique as
a legacy from that time.
Animated toys and puppets are common characters in the films made by the
pioneer in animation of puppets, Ladislaw Starewicz (1882-1965)- from
the European East. Starewicz was an excellent photographer and an entomology
lover, so he decided to adopt the Stop Motion technique to show the behaviour
of the insects. His first animations were made with beetles and one of
his first films- "The beautiful Leukanida" from 1910 was a success
.Its effect was so amazing, and at first inexplicable, that some English
journalists said that Starewicz had filmed live insects skilfully trained
by a Russian scientist. Some time and many films later, Starevicz recognised
that his insect characters were limited, and started making films with
puppets, like "Town Rat and Country Rat" from 1926, among others.
Starewicz invented the 3-D animation film with uninterrupted movements
(films with puppets) in 1910 and went on producing films using this technique
even after retiring in 1959 until his death in 1965.
Although his films were made for children, they would be considered weird
today, owing to the fact that his characters many times were grotesque…however,
we cannot forget that what used to be childish at the beginning of the
twentieth century was much more intense than what is produced for children
nowadays! His puppets include animals made anthropomorphic and quite realistic,
such as frogs, bears, and rabbits or toys and demoniac vegetables. Most
of his fascinating films last less than 15 minutes and are overwhelming,
even according to the recent standards. We can see little or none wire
in scenes extremely complex, mixing things like dozens of intricate puppets
in simultaneous movements, like leaves swinging in the wind, lights waving
rhythmically, wavy water, and real people in back-projection. One of his
most impressive films is "The Mascot" (FRA 1934/26 min/Black
and White) "The Mascot" is far the most famous film by Starewicz.
It appeared in several shapes along the years, having been frequently
transmitted even on the television programme Night Plight in the USA,
in the 1980s. The story turns around a puppet-dog that is given life while
the poor lady who is making it sews a tear inside its chest. She has a
daughter whose biggest wish is to have an orange. And how times have changed!
The dog crosses the hell to get the orange, fighting against every devil,
puppets, and even the Satan.
George
Pal was born (1908-1980) in a traditionally theatrical Hungarian family.
But, the Nazism and consequently the Second World War gave him the opportunity
to go to the United States, more specifically to Hollywood. It was there
that Pal influenced the film Industry and moulded the imagination of a
whole cinematographer Hungarian generation. Hired by Paramount he created
a series of short motion picture made up of animation called "George
Pal Puppetoons". In this series he used wood puppets meticulously
engraved and photographed to create a three dimensional animation that
had not been seen before. Puppets that turned and whirled around in a
ballroom at the sound of Strauss waltz. Pal won an award from the Academy
with his puppets, the first of the five in his career.
Pal will always be remembered as a brilliant visionary that deeply changed
the art of the animation films. As an animator Pal was a pioneer in Stop
Motion. In the 1950s he brought this kind of animation to the films live-action
such as "A Guerra dos Mundos"(The War of Worlds), "The
Time Machine", and As Sete Faces do Dr Lao (Doctor Lao`s seven faces).
Pal`s influence on the cinema can be noticed nowadays in George Lucas`,
Steven Spielberg`s, and Gene Roddenberry`s works.
The Disney, itself, due to the good results achieved by the animators
from that time, like George Pal, decided to invest in Stop Motion, in
this way two films emerged "Noah's Ark" in 1959, and "Symposium
on popular Songs" in 1962. Although they were nominated for the Oscar,
they did not have big repercussion, and consequently the Disney world
decided to abandon the technique.
Considered
the international artist, the Czech Jiri Trnka (1910-1969), left great
contributions to Stop Motion having in mind a universal animation. He
created the school from Prague, which was specialised in Stop Motion;
poetry is a feature of his work. The great challenge in animation is to
make the creations seem to be acting according to their own will, seem
to have personality, soul, and give the impression that they are not being
conducted by anyone. Trnka`s puppets do have soul. They are animated with
mastery and they enchant and impress us. Poetry is constant in his work.
Trnka`s art gives life to paper cutouts like in the film "The Merry
Circus". His last film "The Hand" is without any doubt
one of his most significant films. It represents the human condition that
is the capacity to fight for their rights, and freedom to express their
ideas in a totalitarian regime. Its contribution to the animation cinema
is priceless. See European East
Another
remarkable Czech animator was Jan Svankmajer; he was born in Prague in
1934, where he still lives. His work is characterised by black humour,
the representation of a waning world, claustrophobia, and Kafka confusion,
like in the film from 1989 "Darkness, Light Darkness".
Jan Svankmajer is one of the great names from Czech animation. He studied
at Prague School, in the puppet department. He made his first film in
1964 and for 30 years he made some of his most memorable animation films,
having influence on cinematographers and animators from Tim Burton to
the brothers Quay. His stories are full of surreal and morbid elements.
His mastery of the technique is perfect, be they either clay or creation
of objects and puppets. See European East
The
brothers Quay were greatly influenced by Svankmajer. Stephen and Timothy
Quay were born near Philadelphia in 1947. After studying at Philadelphia
College Art they moved to London and entered the Royal College Art when
they made their first animation film. After winning an award for the film
"Nocturna Artificialia", they founded the Konick Studios in
London together with Keith Griffins, who they met at Royal College of
Art.
They were inspired by animators, composers, and writers from the European
East, who had a strange effect on their films, whose aesthetics had a
mysterious atmosphere, poetic fragments, parts of music, an especial treatment
from the light, and their morbid textures, all these elements contributed
to the originality of their productions. Like in the film "The Cabinet
of Jan Svankmajer" in 1984, made to pay homage to the brilliant Czech
animator, who greatly influenced them. The brothers Quay have a great
passion for details, an excellent control over the colour and textures,
and great ability to deal with the camera. They are true masters of miniatures;
in their small sets they can create unforgettable worlds landscape suggestive
of children's repressed dreams. Their films are not restricted to time,
they prefer to investigate what they call poetry of the shades in an atmosphere
of secrets and conspiracies.
One of the
most remarkable animators nowadays is Garri Bardin, of Russian origin.
He does not think of himself as a conventional animator but as an experimenter.
He started writing scripts and decided to make his own films, however,
he was not satisfied with the result of his first work. In his animations
Bardin uses the animation traditional method- Stop Motion. He makes short
live- action as well. To be a Russian animator is not easy nowadays. On
the USSR times he was regularly paid, but it has become very difficult
to get loan to make films nowadays. But even so, with the least resource
he manages to get wonderful results like in the film "The Colling
Prankster" from 1987, all made with wire. His work has creative and
meaningful scripts.
In
1982, a young American artist, Tim Burton (1958), who worked at Disney
Studio, decided to came up with a bizarre idea: to produce a short terror
movie in Stop Motion, for children "Vincent". It tells a story
of a strange little boy who dreams becoming like his idol: the famous
actor of horror films Vincent Price. The puppet created by Burton was
angular, with an unusual design and bizarre. The film was made in black
and white and Vincent Price himself did the narration for the film. The
film could not be considered a Disney traditional type. Burton continued
his career making live-action movies, but an idea that he had while working
at Disney Studios still tormented him. It was them that he decided to
put his idea in practice and begun to produce the film, "Nightmare
Before Christmas" (1993) which nowadays has become reference when
talking Stop Motion movies.
The production of this movie brought together the best animators of Stop
Motion at that time. "Nightmare Before Christmas" was also the
first Stop Motion movie to be distributed throughout the world. The preparation
of the frightened characters meticulously planned so that they really
look like Burton´s sketches. The sets were grotesquely elaborated
creating a surrealistic world full of strange textures.
Two hundred and twenty seven puppets were made which included vampires,
ghosts and werewolves, mummies and many others. Many of these puppets
had several heads or faces that could be substitute during the animation
process, which was well executed in a sophisticated version of the methods
used before by George Pal.
The
talented animator Henry Sellick directed "Nightmare Before Christmas",
who shortly after the great success of the movie was invited by Disney
in 1996 to do the movie "James and The Giant Peach" which was
based on a children story taking from a book written by Roald Dahl. Despite
the excellent story and the very original characters the movie was not
a success.
The Aardman
Studio founded by Peter Lord and David Sproxton, more than 20 years ago.
Their first movies were created on a kitchen table and were made of clay
and very little equipment. They considered animation as hobby and experimented
many things since their adolescence. They begun to create their own movies
very early: with the camera that belonged to David´s father who
worked for BBC. The BBC, which had an animated series, made especially
for deaf children bought some of their movies. The character, which they
created, was called Aardman from then on it was a story of many successful
events. Pioneers in creating animated movies by molded character. They
soon started to produce sophisticated short movies, commercials and television
programmes. Peter Lord was twice indicated to receive the Academy award
for his films "Adam" 1991 and "Wat´s Pig" 1996.
Lord is also the creator of "Morph", a popular clay character
created specially for BBC.
When
the Aardman Studios became famous, a talented animator Nick Park went
to work with them. He was born in Preston in England in 1958, and he started
working with animation at the age of 13; since them he has worked with
many different projects. Nick Park won three Academy Awards for his films:
"Creature Comforts" 1989, "The wrong trousers" 1993
and "A close shave" 1995. The Aardman Studio made its full-length
movie "Chicken Run" 2000. They spent 4 years producing the film
and the results were fantastic. Peter Lord and Nick Park directed the
film that tells the story of chickens determined to escape to their grange
that is compared to a concentrate camp.
Will
Vinton was born in McMinnville, Oregon in the United States in 1948. He
studied architecture and physics at University of California in Berkeley.
Fascinated by the fluid designs of works of Gaudí, he begun to
experiment with mixture of clay and film. After his graduation Vinton
entered in the world of production, where he worked as a director, sound
technician and editor in a variety of projects. His film "Closed
Mondays" 1975 co-created with Bob Gardiner won de Academy Award for
the best-animated film. Sometimes after this he founded the Will Vinton
Studio, which works on projects for television and the movie industry:
commercials, programmes and films. Their characters seem to be life-like
a have their own personality. Expression of emotions can be seem in their
faces and felt in their movement. The Will Vinton Studio works the dimensional
animation, whether it made using computer graphic and Stop Motion.
Among some of his famous works is the video in which Mattel´s Barbie
doll comes alive for the first time in "Dance! Workout with Barbie"
they also created the M&M characters created for the Mars campaign.
They have also made several video clips for Michael Jackson and for Disney.
STOP MOTION AS SPECIAL EFFECTS
Many people made and still do extraordinary films using Stop Motion technology,
technology that very much used in films which monsters and other unreal
creatures co-starring with real life actors. Models made with very artfully
and with ingenious mechanism of movement were filmed frame by frame. Following
this, the animation work was superimposed upon the film, in which the
real actors had been filmed.
This
is how Willis O´Brien (1886-1962) made the first "King Kong"
film in 1933. Who was considered to be the father, the mother and the
grand father of special effects in movies. The most glorious and legendary
pioneer of this kind of art). The whole technical evolution, including
the revolutionary digital effects of the "Industrial, Light and Magic"
of George Lucas in the 1980´s is to be accredited to the genius
of Willis O´Brien. He was born in Oackland, California and he began
his career in 1906 at the age of 20, when he made drawings for the "Daily
News" of San Francisco.
Little by little he developed and perfected his peculiar animation technique.
In 1918 the film, "The Ghost of Slumber Mountain", had its premiere
and the audience saw for the first time the invasion of pre-historic monsters
coming to attack the human race. The year 1933 was the year of "King
Kong", the gigantic gorilla that was seen on screen, co-starring
with miniature frightened actors was in reality, a small and inoffensive
model that became alive and grew in sizes by means of Stop Motion techniques.
To use Stop Motion to animated models, at that time, was still a novelty.
Willis O´Brien finally won an Oscar for special effects in another
film in which the star was a giant gorilla, "Might Joe Young"
in 1949. Among his many films several stand out for the mastery of his
special effects:
· "Monster of the Past" - Willis O´Brien EUA/1923/
tones of sepia and green A documentary about the world ten million years
ago when giant reptiles dominated the Earth.
· "Prehistoric Poultry" - Willis O´Brien EUA/1917/Black
& White - a very humouristic story about Dinirnis, the oldest ancestor
of today's chicken.
· "R.F.D. 10.000 B.C." - Willis O´Brien EUA/1917/Black
& White - The adventures and mishaps of pre-historic postal service.
· "The Dinossaur and the Missing Link" - Willis O´Brien
EUA/1915-1917/ Black & White - The first film in which the director
O´Brien created the first animated characters possessing a metal
skeleton. Wild Willie, the missing link, is the terror of the fields.
The American
Ray Harryhausen (1920) was only thirteen-year-old when he saw the movie
"King Kong" for the first time. He was so impressed that he
procured Willis O´Brien with whom he learned how to make models
and films using Stop Motion. He also worked in George Pal´s Puppetoons
series. At the time Ray was searching for new challenges, this is the
reason why he worked with the great animators of his time. He went on
to become a great master of this art, in with it he created such unforgettable
movies such as, "Jason and the Argonauts" (1963), "Sinbad´s
Seventh Voyage" (1958), "The Clash of Titans" (1981) and
many others.
His unique technique contributed for Stop Motion animation and inspired
a whole generation of animators and special effects artists.
George
Lucas (1944), who in his youth was considered to be a terrible student,
is today one of the great names in entertainment, a visionary and a great
businessman. He began his career creating special effects for live-action
movies, effects that were created using Stop Motion technique. He was
most responsible for the change in the movie industry such as we know
today. In the beginning of his career he made films using Stop Motion
and today he uses effects created in the computer. This is what we called
Computer Graphic, which is a technological evolution of Stop Motion technique.
He was a fanatic for comics magazines and after he decided to follow career
in the cinema he became an excellent student attending the University
of Southern California. Years later he start to produce "Star Wars,
episode 4" (1977). Due to gigantic challenges that the production
of this movie demanded (it needed special effects that had never been
used before), he decided to create the "Industrial Light and Magic",
a place of special effects and a large laboratory in which all the new
technology was studied and created in an attempt to find solutions for
the problems in producing the film, from sound, editing and effects everything
was reinvented. The research, which was carried out, and the personal
involvement of Lucas were decisive factors, for his film becoming a great
success and reference throughout the world. Besides all the great technological
innovations that he brought to the movie industry.
Soon... Phil Tippet
