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Stop Motion: Craft Skills for Model Animation (Focal Press Visual Effects and Animation)
 
 
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Stop Motion: Craft Skills for Model Animation (Focal Press Visual Effects and Animation) [Paperback]

Susannah Shaw
5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)

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Stop Motion: Craft Skills for Model Animation (Focal Press Visual Effects and Animation) Stop Motion: Craft Skills for Model Animation (Focal Press Visual Effects and Animation) 4.8 out of 5 stars (6)
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Product details

  • Paperback: 224 pages
  • Publisher: Focal Press (3 Sep 2003)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0240516591
  • ISBN-13: 978-0240516592
  • Product Dimensions: 24.4 x 18.8 x 1.4 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 607,799 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • See Complete Table of Contents

More About the Author

Susannah Shaw
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Product Description

Review

'A wonderful introduction to a rather complicated and unique art form.'
Ray Harryhausen director of The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, and Jason and the Argonauts

'Don't attempt stop motion before you read this book! Susannah has covered everything in this no-nonsense approach to the industry.'
Richard Goleszowski director of Creature Comforts and Rex the Runt

'Stop Motion contains a huge amount of valuable information for the budding stop-frame film maker. A great addition to the film craft library.'
David Sproxton, co-founder and Managing Director of Aardman Animations

'Practical, informative and full of quotes from key characters in the story of the stop-frame industry. I wish I'd had this book when I was a student.'
Joan Ashworth, Head of Animation, Royal College of Art

'When it comes to animating, this excellent book covers timing of movement, story development from idea to script, compositing you shots, editing and so on. Susannah's book will certainly make you want to get out there and get started on model animation.'
Pat Raine Webb, Animatoon magazine, February 2004

"...a mine of information. This book gives an unrivalled detailed technical overview of the subject."
The Times Higher Education Supplement

"...an attractive, easy to handle paperback with clear and concise text...This is the perfect book for anyone contemplating getting into model animation."
Dope Sheet

"This is a truly fantastic book. If you want to learn how to do stop motion animation film-making or to do animation well, read this book closely, do the exercises and follow the instructions. This book is beautifully laid out and illustrated with copious useful diagrams and photographs."
Focus magazine

Richard Goleszowski director of Creature Comforts and Rex the Runt

'Don't attempt stop motion before you read this book! Susannah has covered everything in this no-nonsense approach to the industry.'

Inside This Book (Learn More)
First Sentence
If you want to make great animation, you need to know how to control a whole world: how to make a character, how to make that character live and be happy or sad. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful
All You Need To Know! 22 Jan 2004
Format:Paperback
This book has all you need to know about animation, especially stop frame animation. This simple to follow guide has someting for amatures and pro's alike.
Having been lectured by the author I can easily confirm she knows what she's talking about!
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16 of 18 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I've always been interested in clay animation, since the early day's of Tony Hart's 'Morph' I've been tinkering around with animation and drawing cartoons as a hobby. Now i'm actually able to get under the covers of the industry and learn the tricks of the trade. I can take my own 2D character 'Godfrey' and breathe life into him, professionally.

It's so easy to read. It doesn't waffle on for ages. The author gets straight to the point and helpfully reminds you what to look out for along the way.

Thoroughly worth while purchase that I highly recommend to any budding cartoonist or animator who's ever been interested in stop motion animation. It's written and endorsed by the professionals. There's no where else to look. Buy it now.

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:  9 reviews
18 of 18 people found the following review helpful
Treasure Chest of Hard-to-Find Stop Motion Information 8 Nov 2003
By Anaconda - Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback
Stop Motion Animation is also known as "Puppet Animation". You may have seen it before .... movies like Nightmare Before Christmas, Chicken Run, and the classic works by master stop motion animator, Ray Harryhausen. You also may have seen stop motion used in TV commercials, like the Brisk Iced Tea spots (Bruce Lee, James Brown, etc.) or the Chevron talking cars commercials. Stop Motion uses real miniature puppets fabricated from various materials like foam rubber, plastics, metal, or clay (like Gumby or the singing California Raisens). The puppets are about the size of a Barbie-type doll with an internal wire or jointed skeleton. Using a movie camera or video cam, the puppets/figures are placed in front of camera, then the arms, legs, head, etc. are incrementally moved (animated) frame by frame. When the film or video is played back at regular speed, the puppets appear to be moving on their own.

Having been involved with stop motion, doing professional work for about 16 plus years, I can tell you that "how-to" information about this esoteric and arcane animation art/craft is indeed very rare today. This is because "computer animation" techniques are now dominating the animation market and the public does not see the hand crafted works of stop motion animation, as often. Susannah Shaw's book includes difficult to find information about the overall production aspects of Stop Motion/Puppet Animation. At the time of this review, there are no other books that covers the entire stop motion process as well as this book does. Do a search on the internet and you will see that published books specifically about stop motion production, are almost non-existent. If the author cannot cover a particular area in depth, she has provided a very comprehensive appendix of resources, materials, suppliers, and other informational sources where you can find out more about Stop Motion Animation. This book is a great introduction for beginners, students, intermediates and for schools or universities who wish to cover this unique animation craft in their curriculum. Get it now while it is available and you can help keep Stop Motion ALIVE in the new millennium!

You should also add these other books to your animation library: "Creating 3D Animation" by Peter Lord; "The Animators Survival Kit" by Richard Williams; and "Tim Burton's Nightmare Before Christmas" by Thompson & Burton.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful
Excellent practical guide 9 Nov 2003
By Nicholas B. Hilligoss - Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback
This is probably as good a guide to the many craft areas required for stop motion animation as we're likely to get in one volume. More direct and individual than computer 3d animation, stop motion has two main traditions - as a special effects tool for bringing life to the impossible in the hands of masters like Ray Harryhausen and Jim Danforth, and as an art form with it's roots in a European puppet theatre tradition. It is this area of puppet film that stop motion is now most vigorous, as exemplified by contemporary masters like Nick Park and Barry Purves, and this book contains many direct quotes from professionals offering insights into their ways of working. The book covers the basics of writing the story, creating the characters, constructing sets and puppets, lighting, photography, and animation techniques at a level that is practical for a beginner or intermediate, with much to offer the more experienced animator. A fully comprehensive guide would need to be in six fat volumes, as many of the crafts involved (like armature machining, or cinemaphotography) need a book to themselves to fully cover those fields .
This is not a coffee-table book on the history and variety of stop motion, but a guide which will help the would-be animator to actually make an animated film.
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Excellent informative book 14 Jan 2004
By M. Strange - Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback
I am in the middle of producing my own stop motion film and this book has really helped guide my production.... from creating armatures to set construction to animation... this book has a little of everything for those of us who have chosen this "lost art" of stop motion animation. This is a great book for anyone that is serious about getting their stop motion film made... I am constantly referring back to it because it is loaded with useful information. So I would definetly reccomend this book to anyone interested in making their own stop motion animation.
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