Inspired by Thoreau’s Walden (Life in the woods) and my pursuit to learn basic animation skills, I created this simple short teaser this evening.

Stumbled over a piece of software for mac today which allows you to record off whatever is on your screen and edit it afterwards.

ScreenFlow is:

An application for creating amazing screen recordings on your Mac. Using a unique new screen capture system, powerful enough to capture the contents of your entire desktop at the same time as your video camera, microphone and computer’s audio, it’s simple to create beautiful screencasts.

Read more and download it from Apple.com.

Click to watch video demo of ScreenFlow:

PS: You have to purchase the licence to export movies that does not say DEMO all over the place. It costs $99 which I thought was quite expensive.

Lets wait until we find a really useful project

….because here is what I did with it:

…and extending it to a tribute to a drunk Jens Stoltenberg (Norway’s PM):

Pixeldoggy in Germany animated a character using a press conference recording of the famous football coach and player Giovanni Trapattoni. Hillarious!

See the original press conference with Giovanni Trapattoni here.

Never heard of him? See Wikipedia article.

As described in a previous post, my current personal project is learning the basics of animation.

I haven’t decided technique, concept or story yet, but in this post I explore model making equipment using clay and computer software.

Model making and equipment

I went to the toy store to get some plasticine. Bought something which to me looked more like Play-doh. Tried to do mold it in to shape, but it was way to soft and just fell a part.

Do NOT purchase this stuff.

Can probably use it to do some scenery or something but not for the models.

Went to a hobby shop in Oslo instead called Panduro and got something called “Eberhard Faber modell-leire” at 19 kr per pack.

This felt more like plasticine. Also bought a wire for creating “skeletons” to make the models easier to move and more durable.

Spent the remaining time I had playing around with the plasticine and creating some small bunnies. The grey bunny in the background in the image below was done with the play-doh like plasticine and also the carrots etc. As you can see it is already started falling apart and the carrots appear to be cooked!

Much easier to work with the black bunny which was done with the other kind of plasticine which I got later.

What software should I use? Simple test of iMovie

Apparently there is a lot of fancy software you can purchase. For me, this is a personal project, so I have no budget. Decided to look at free options. First, I did a very simple test on software to see if I could use iMovie which comes for free with Apple Macs for the animation.

Turns out you can adjust the timing for each image. This is really all I needed at the moment.

For the fun of it, I snapped a few pics with my Iphone and imported into iMovie. Obviously you need to use a tripod etc and plan this better when you are doing it for real – but I think it is always useful just playing around a little to learn the software.

Choose timing for the image by clicking the small clock icon.

You also have to remember to remove the Ken Burns effect which iMovie automatically adds to any image (by clicking the “crop” icon and choosing “Fit”).

My first animation!

You can see the result below of my simple two-frame animation.

I decided my next personal project was going to be:

“Create stop motion animation using plasticine”

For the record (as will be clear any minute now): I know nothing of animation. I decided I wanted to learn a little of this art myself. No idea where to begin.

This is a true beginners project – which of course is kind of the point of doing personal projects: Aquiring new skills and doing something different.

My colleague from the Norwegian Design Council, Kristian Paulsen, has some experience in animation and has promised to help me out. Check out some animations he has done on his website (under “Produksjoner” in top level navigation. Select the link “Blikk på musikk” for example).

But as I had some time off today,  I decided to get started and do test some small things so that I have an idea of what is entailed.

What is stop-motion?

Stop motion means taking an image, stopping and adjusting the movement of whatever you are animating, and then taking a new photo (hence the name: Stop motion….as you start and stop, and just play the photos really quickly in sequence). Every photo then becomes one frame in the film. Usually there is about 25 frames per second in a movie, which means you need a LOT of images to create just a few seconds of film.

Links to excellent animators who deserve your kudos:

I love stop motion animation films and shorts using plasticine. Everyone knows Wallace & Gromit of course, but other people are worth checking out as well:

• Russian/Norwegian animator Pjotr Sapegin are well worth checking out, it you don’t know of him. View his filmography here (IMDB.com).
• Robot Chicken – check out the Star Wars episode
• Passion Pictures and their ad for Sony Bravia Website
• Pingu – used to love it as a kid! Watch here.

En tjeneste eller et produkt kan forbedres radikalt, og det trenger ikke å ta flere måneder. Man kan komme veldig langt på 10 minutter!

Creuna i Danmark deltok på UX Intensive hvor man i ulike workshops skal jobbe intensivt med konseptuell design og user experience (brukeroppelevelse). Her er hva de fikk ut av det: 10 konsepter på 10 minutter.

Det hele er nesten magisk!

Jeg spurte dere om hvilke briller jeg skulle velge i min forrige post. Dere svarte – og her er resultatene:

Kandidat 3: Moods – Stryn    55%
Kandidat 2: Moods – Erdal    27%
Kandidat 1: Peak – Vail             9%
Ingen av de, prøv noe annet.   9%

Og valget falt på: Moods of Norway “Stryn”

Takk for hjelpen både på poll og kommentarer. Fantastisk å kunne velge briller basert på wisdom of the crowd!

PS: Moods of Norway kommer på Faglig frokost (i regi av Norsk Designråd) på DogA 12. september. Meld deg på her!

Jeg er lei av brillene mine. Æsj. BORING! Og nå siden de har 99% på innfatninger på Brilleland så slo jeg til, dvs jeg lånte med meg tre par briller hjem for nøye vurdering. Det bemerkes at intensjonen var å finne noen litt store briller – derfor er alle tre parene egentlig såkalte “herrebriller”. Jeg har jo allerede sånne andre briller.

Kan dere hjelpe meg å velge?

For anledningen har jeg bevisst valgt å ikke sminke meg. Dette er elegant akkompagnert med ikke å ha vasket håret siden…la-meg-nå-se…fredag. Den totale (smatt smatt) kreasjonen er toppet med rive-ned-taket-i-gangen klærne som jeg gjorde nettopp (thrill!!). Derfor må dere bare IMAGINE hvordan det ville vært med fint hår og sminke, ok?

Kandidat #1: Peak “Vail”

Kandidat #2: Moods of Norway “Erdal”

Kandidat #3: Moods of Norway “Stryn”

Så kom igjen med terningkastene! Comments please, eller bruk pollen under (ny!):

Pollen er nå stengt – se resultatet her.

Inspired by a visit to Astrup Fearnley today – the museum for contemporary art in Oslo which owns the Jeff Koons scuplture: Michael Jackson and Bubbles (currently on display in London in the Serpentine Gallery – probably increased in value now…), I had to create some “art” myself. So, here goes: My own little MJ tribute:

Michael i det norske hus / Michael in the Norwegian home / 2009