Final Video

I'm overall a little disappointed on how my video turned out as you can tell they are taken as images in the change of the lighting. However, at the time I had the television on and didn't realise it affected the images as much as this. 

Evaluation

My stop motion video is of 3 different piles of DVD's moving up and down. I gained this idea from my DVD's, in my bedroom. As I have so many DVD's I thought that I could move them around simililar to a Coca Cola video. I tried to move the DVD's up and down in the 3 rows as though it was the base in the music that was making them move up and down. The music on the video is Nero - Crush on you, I chose this song as I thought the middle part of the song would sound really good with the movement of the DVD's.
I used a Canon 1000D to photograph the images and also a camera stand to keep the camera in the same place so when the images were put together they looked good. I also used a shutter release button, to help stop movement of the camera.
I came across a few problems at times such as the camera would focus in on auto focus, so I ended up using manual focus as this solved my problem. Also another problem was that it was tiring and took a long time to swap the DVD's and move them around and it started to hurt my arm. This ment I had to have a few breaks in between which ment that lighting was changing throughout the process. 
My intial video was the video below but as thought this video wasn't that good, I decided last minute to change it as I thought I could do better. I'm now a lot happy with my final video as it fits together better and all the movements link together. It could be better as the lighting conditions change slightly which is noticeable when watching the video. If I were to do this again then i'd make sure that th lighting was the same throughtout all the images and maybe do if for a little longer. However, I'm overall pleased with my video as I like it and think it looks quite good.
I put the video together in Windows Media Player,  I found it easier. As I had been using Apple Software before, I found Windows Media easier to use as I think it is because I am more familiar with the software. I had to change the length of the images so the images would flow. Also I had to chose a part of the song I wanted my video to go with, so I chose the middle of the song as I thought it was the more up beat. 

Stop Motion Video Attempt at Home

This was an attempt of a stop motion video, I produced at home. I didn't have a clue on what to do so I walked around my house to think of ideas. I ended up getting one of my sisters to bounce on the trampoline. This was hard as she couldn't jump in slow motion for me to take an image of her jumping slowly so I told her to jump and I held my finger on the shutter button so i took continuous shots. This was a problem as sometimes the camera didnt take so the images didn't fit together as well as I wanted them to. If I were to do this again, then I would maybe think of a better idea and try to make the images flow better.   

Location Stop Framing Photography Video

Louisa on a Bench

The video (above) is all of the images of Louisa put together using iMovie. I imported all the images into iMovie. I then had to change the images to fit so they would all fill the page instead of moving in and out on the images. I took screen grabs (below) to give examples of what i had to do for each picture. There are 39 pictures in this video. I put this soundtrack to it as i thought it went well with the movement of Louisa. 

Stop Motion Video - 1st Attempts

George Swimming

The video (above) is all the images of George swimming put together. To create this video I had to import all the images into iMovie. I then had to cut the images and change them to fit so they would fill the page instead of zooming in and out of the images. The screen grabs below show roughly what I had to do to every image. In this video there are 24 images to produce it. I have put a bubbles 
soundtrack to the video as i think they are related to the image.  

Dylan Skateboarding

In this video are all the images taken in the studio of Dylan on his skateboard. To create this video I had to put all the images into iMovie. As these images are portrait images I had to turn them around as they were upside down in iMovie this involved me clicking on each image and rotating it. After this I had to do the same as George's video by making the images all to size fit. The screen grabs below show what I had to do. 

Location Stop Framing Photography

We did location photography today, as we hadn't bought in our props to go into the studio. We will be in the studio next Wednesday instead and from now until then I will prepare properly. This will include me: drawing a rough plan of what each image is going to look like, choosing props, choosing camera type, camera position and camera lighting.


Today, we went out in Burton with a Canon 400D and a tripod. We used the manual settings on the camera so we could have full control on what the camera was doing. We used a tripod to keep the camera in the same position and to stop any handshake blur happening. This helped to make the images flow throughout the video as all of the images were in the same position at all times. We went out with the thought off creating videos involving us moving around trees and something at the park. Between Kayley, Louisa and I we produced 3 videos, one on a bench another around trees and the last one on the park.

In the first video, we went to a bench and Louisa moved around the bench in slow movements. We set the tripod to the right angle and height and set the camera to the right apeture, shutter speed and ISO setting, to make sure the image was as good as it could be. We then got Louisa to move around the bench in small steps. However, I think it could be improved as from looking through the images on the camera, Louisa wasn't in the same position all the way round so if we were to do it again we would have to make sure she doesn't make any big movements with her hands or head. For this video Kayley was incontrol of the camera and I was telling Louisa how far to move.

In the second video, we went to the front of college amongst the trees as we thought of hiding around trees. I was in control of the camera this time and telling the girls when to move after i had taken an image every time they moved. Kayley hid behind one tree and Louisa hide behind another and they moved towards each other. We set up the tripod and camera to the level and height we wanted to and the settings on the camera to make the images good. We decided to do this stop motion video behind trees as we had seen other stop motion videos like it and we wanted to create our own version. I think we could improve this motion video by getting a closer view of the video as it looks quite far away and isn't very clear. 

In the last video, we went to the park. Louisa wanted to me to slide down the slide and then move back up the slide. We put the camera in the position we want it to be in and changed the aperture, ISO and shutter speed as we had changed location. It seemed easy at first just going down the slide but it was hard for me to go back up the slide as it was hard to keep myself up. I think this is obvious in the pictures and one thing we could of improved to make it more realistic. We did this as we thought it would be good to watch me going down and then back up but it didn't work as well as we had hoped. 

Stop Framing Photography Experiment

Today, we went in the studio to experiment with stop framing photography. The whole group came together with ideas to create 3 different quick examples of stop framing photography. We used a selection of different materials and objects from the studio to help us create our background and story of the photography. In the shoot we used a 5D Canon Camera, Bowens lighting equipment, props, fabrics, suitcase, camera stand and a step ladder. All this equipment was needed to make our photo video. Making a stop frame video takes a lot of time and people to help produce a good video. 

I enjoyed being in the studio, working with the whole group and i've realised stop framing photography isn't as easy as it looks. There are a lot of things you need to consider when producing one such as: 

- lighting

- camera settings and position

- what's going to be in the each picture

- what movement is going to be made in each picture

- safety for people in the studio

- who is going to move the objects or props in each picture

This is the example video, that Mr Steve made up, on the spot, to give us an example on how easy it is to produce a picture. We used coloured sheets in this video to create the background. This clip is of a boy swimmming in the sea, to try and produce the look of the sea we had two people at each end of the blue sheet holding it and moving it to create the movement of the waves. Then George moved his arms, in slow movements, to make it look like he was swimmming. George found it hard to move his arms as he was on his side and can't move his arms properly. We took 24 photos in this video. As this was our first making of a stop framing video with didn't really know what to

do in this video. We weren't sure on how small the movements could be in order for it to look good.

The second clip we did was of dylan on his skate board. We kept moving the skateboard in different positions and dylan moved himself in slow movements to make it look as though he was riding the skateboard. The group up with the idea when we were going along that dylan was going to do a few tricks and then fall off his skateboard. We used the purple and red sheets to create a colourful background and the yellow sheet to create a pipe. By moving the skateboard and dylan in small movements we were able to create a realistic video. I think that this image could be improved by having more of the pipe and also that dylan and the skateboard were closer to the pipe instead of being in mid air skating. Overall this worked well and i will be making it into a video and choosing a selection of music to go with the clip.

In the third clip, we did a clip of a girl walking with a suitcase. We used a blue sheet to create the sky and a grey sheet to represent the path and a few white sheets to create the clouds and a yellow sheet for the sun. We had two girls moving the clouds to make it look like that Samantha was moving but instead the objects around her were moving. She was just moving her legs in a walking position, to make it look like she was moving. The group helped Samantha to move her body and the suitcase in every image, in slow movements, as the suticase was quite difficult to move.

From this experiment, I have gained a few ideas on what stop frame video I would like to produce. Also I know how much effort needs to be put in order for me to create a good stop motion video. 

Western Spaghetti by PES

I chose to publish this stop motion video on to my blog as it instantly caught my attention. I think it is really creative and unique. It is inspiring to me as i think it is well thought of and i would like to try and produce a unique stop motion video myself. 

Rihanna - Man Down