Finally got my animation finished today, something of a last minute rush. A big thanks to everyone who helped out - my computer skills need work, but overall an enjoyable experience. Admittedly I was a bit ambitious with what I took on, which is reflected in the end result, but sure that's how you learn I suppose. I will definately be doing more animation, even if it's only as a hobby, as I've been bitten by the bug. As I said before there's endless scope for creativity in this medium, not to mention the growing market. The growing number of animated programs for an older audience on mainstream t.v. proves that animation is not just for kids. Or maybe we've never really grown out of them. Still the fact that they're so widely accepted is a bonus for animators and animation fans.
So as time became an issue with finishing my animation I was unable to include all I had originally intended. That was probably just as well as it played for far longer than I'd anticipated without including everything. Eventually got it down to a reasonable time, to go with the background music, and it's still quite long. Any way I have a few images to upload of some of the props I used

     

The poor doll involved in this device had to be decapitated, for the sake of art, to facilitate the metal bracket I fabficated - with three revisions - to carry the camera. But don't worry, a team of highly trained surgeons were able to re-attach it again for later scenes. Notice the pushrods underneath to move the feet. Had to make rails for them to keep them straight. Ofcourse all these little extras added to the time involved but this sort of troubleshooting can be interesting. (any resemblence to the canteen stirring-sticks is purely coincidental)

This time the blonde WASN'T the star, she was only on board for her arms. A 'hand' model.

You can always count on the army when you need extras.

So there's a sample of what it involved. And I thought I was keeping it simple. Anyway I won't complain as I enjoyed it and gained some valuable experience along the way. Now I'm off to grab a well earned cold beer. 

Hi folks, bin mad busy this week. I started my two weeks at animation last monday, and while I knew there would be a lot of work involved, I wasn't expecting it to be as time consuming as it is. This was my own fault though as I got a bit carried away with my script. I mean I kept it short, as advised, but there is so much to do it's a bit overwhelming. I decided on the stop-motion technique so I'd avoid the hundreds of drawings involved if drawing the images. But now I have to make sets, which has turned out to be the most time consuming part. Though it is enjoyable. Coming from a construction background certainly helps. Plus there's the pride in seeing the end result, and knowing that you've created it, that there's something to show for the time and effort that went into the work. Of course it may all be pointless if I don't get finished in time, which I have to confess is becoming a worry at this stage.

Anyway my script involves two characters and the main character isn't seen. What I mean is the story is shown from their perspective, so you see what they see. This meant that the camera would have to be their eyes. It looked a lot easier on paper. The opening scene involved the main character walking along a pavement while looking at her feet. I assumed this would be easy. I was wrong. To cut a long story short I had to make a jig - think that's what it's called - to hold the character. I'm using a toy doll by the way. So the doll had to be secured to this, along with the camera, and a system of moving the feet. It also had to move along the pavement (slabs drawn on paper). To be honest this mechanism took days to refine and it's only for the first scene - about six seconds long, so it's not looking good timewise but sure it's a start. Have to say I love it though. The scope for creating is limitless, and for someone imaginative -as we all are, (artists) it's a fabouless medium. I'm going to upload some images of what I've been doing so far.

The image above is a jig the technicians made for me. It's to hold the doll steady while it moves. I've since added a bracket to hold the camera and a system for moving the feet at each frame, as the jig progresses along the pavement.

This image shows how the shoes are moved to indicate walking. A set of rails had to be secured underneath the jig to keep the wooden pushrods straight. They also had to be marked with measurements to keep movements consistent. This was all learned through trial and error - mostly error.

One of my sets is a telephone box which took a whole day to make. Maybe I should have gone with drawing.

A telephone - for the above phone box. Carved from a wax crayon with a scalpel - I kid you not. It's about 3/4" long and it now has a cable attatched. 

Just showing the scale of the telephone box set. The scalpel is roughly the size of a biro so you can see why this is so time consuming. But definately worth it. I think I'm becoming addicted to it.

P.S. My camera was set to black & white for some images as I'm filming this way (old fashioned thriller)

Just have some images to upload by some of the sculptors I've been researching over the past two weeks. The first six images were taken from the book '100 Contemporary Artists' by Taschen.

'Judas was sad' 2007 by Terence Koh. Found skeleton, wood, paint, varnish, artists blood, secret message whispered to judas. 35 x 70 x 65cm

'Line of control' 2008 by Subodh Gupta. Stainless steel structure, stainless steel utensils, 1000 x 1000 x 1000cm. Installation view, Tate triennial, Tate Britain, London 2009

'Temenos' 2006, by Anish Kapoor. middlehaven, Middlesborough

'Untitled' 2000 by Tom Friedman. cinstruction paper 31 x 366 x 305cm

'Untitled' 1999, by Tom Friedman, sugar cubes, 122 x 43 x 25cm

'Green Demon' 2008 by Tom Friedman. Expanding insulation foam, mixed media, 23 x 109 x 91cm

'Pointing the finger' 1994 by Dorothy Cross. Image taken from 'Dorothy Cross' by Charta books.

'Lover snakes' 1995 by Dorothy Cross, Image taken from 'Dorothy Cross' by Charta books.

'Arms' 1996 by Dorothy Cross. Image taken from 'Dorothy Cross' by Charta books.

'Bone Gloves, 2001 by Dorothy Cross. Image taken from 'Dorothy Cross' by Charta books.

'The Wooden Fingers' 1998 by Annette Messager. Gloves, wool 4 x 30M. Exibition at the Palacio de Valazquez, Madrid, 1999. Iamage taken from 'Annette Messager' by catherine Grenier 2000 Pub: Flammarion, France

'Nameless Ones (Anonymes)' 1993 by Annette Messager. Stuffed animals, heads from soft toys, metal poles, lamps, mounds of earth. Overall dimensions 10 x 5M. Musee Cantini, marseilles. Iamage taken from 'Annette Messager' by catherine Grenier 2000 Pub: Flammarion, France

'Penetration' 1993-94 by Annette Messager. Various fabrics, rope. Overall dimensions 20 x 15M. Installation at the Monika Spruth Galerie, Cologne 1994. Iamage taken from 'Annette Messager' by catherine Grenier 2000 Pub: Flammarion, France

'2 Clans 2 Families' 1997-98 by Annette Messager. Photographs, soft toys, wood. Overall dimensions 15 x 12M. Installation at the Musee National des Arts d'Afrique et d'Oceanie, Paris. Iamage taken from 'Annette Messager' by catherine Grenier 2000 Pub: Flammarion, France

Hi folks, second week of sculpture now and everyone's been hard at work. There's some really impressive stuff in the studio. As I mentioned in my last post I'd started working on twisting steel flat bars. I kind of hit a brick wall after that though as I couldn't figure out a way of joining them, other than welding, so I put them to one side - temporarily.

I then started thinking about some sort of twisting mechanism, as a sculpture. So I prepared some wire, cutting to lenghts and straightening. Then I had some parts made in MDF, which I painted with aluminium wood primer. That took several days to dry (a lesson learned). When it was all finally assembled I was surprised to discover that it actually worked as I'd intended. By rotating the handles on the circular plates in opposite directions, the wire strands twisted together. But is it art? Is it sculpture? I'm happy with the result so I guess that's the main thing. Hope you get the idea from the images.

A few other things I've been working on this week include altering the texture of the steel flat bar I was using previously. As you can see in the images I tried disguising the steel with fibres, to give it a soft texture as opposed to the hardness of bare steel. Ideally something more substantial than a single bar could be completely covered in soft fibres to possibly intrigue or surprise the viewer.

I also returned to the twisted steel bars I'd been working with. I figured that as I couldn't join them by welding I'd try joining them with string. This would also incorporate the soft texture I'd tried against the steel earlier. I was just basically trying to come up with a random shape  to see where it would lead.

In the last image you can see I wound some string around part of the steel just to see what effect it would give. The loose bits of string were deliberate - for the same reason. So I'm thinking of maybe trying other materials on other parts of the steel by way of experimenting. Just have to see where it goes.