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Claymation

FYI: For this Module, you'll need some soft modeling clay

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Activity 1: What is Claymation?

(7 minutes)

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If you recognize this man or these chickens, then you’ve watched a claymation movie! Claymation is one type of animation in which an animator makes figures out of clay and then takes lots of photographs of the clay figures as they act out a story. When you string all the photographs together as a video, the clay figures will appear to move.

 

Check out these examples of claymation films created by Boys & Girls Clubs members:

Activity 2: Create a Storyboard

(5-20 minutes)

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Have you completed the Sketch a Story module yet? If so, you could use that story for your claymation film! If you haven’t written a Storyboard, that’s your next step.

 

Your first claymation story should be very short and should not require much dialogue (dialogue is when characters talk to each other). Telling an interesting story quickly and without dialogue is challenging. What kind of story could you tell this way?

 

Ask yourself these questions:

  • What is a story you could tell in less than one minute?

  • How will you communicate the story without dialogue (or with very little dialogue)?

  • Who will your characters be? (You should have no more than three characters)

 

Now, sketch out a storyboard for your story. Here’s an example of how simple your first claymation  storyboard could be.

 

Story: The Happy Gardener

Characters: Gardener, Flower

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Beginning: Man plants seed             Middle: Plant grows           End: Flower blooms, Man smiles

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If you want, you could use one of these sample stories:

  • A blob moves through a city and devours anything in its path. Each time it eats a toy, object, or character, it gets bigger.

  • A child builds a snowman. The child leaves. The snowman comes to life. The snowman looks around and sees that he is alone. The snowman builds another snowman to hang out with.

Activity 3: Build your Characters

(20 minutes)

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Grab some clay and start building your characters!


Check out these claymation characters. What do you notice about them?

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Here are a few tips when you build your own:

  • Keep it Simple. No elaborate details

  • By drawing eyes or a mouth with a toothpick or similar tool, you can erase and change the shape of the mouth for different shots and make your character laugh, smile, talk, etc.

  • Build your character so that it can stand up on its own. You can do this by making the feet much heavier than the head and shoulders.

  • You character doesn’t have to be 100% Clay. Sometimes, designers make a stick figure out of wire or pipe cleaners and then add clay around the figure’s “skeleton.”

  • If you want, you could incorporate small toys like LEGO characters or other materials for your characters to interact with.

Activity 4: Set the Stage

(20 minutes) 

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Gather All your Materials:

  • Your Storyboard

  • Your Characters

  • A digital camera or smart phone

  • A tripod for your camera (if the camera shakes or moves, it ruins your film)

  • A lamp (so you can shine a bright light onto your characters while you photograph them)

  • Extra clay or props to use in your story

  • A background is optional. Some club members draw or paint their own backgrounds.

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Activity 5: And...Action!

(45 minutes)

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  1. Set up your characters as they appear in the first frame of your storyboard. Take a photo!

  2. Move your character(s) a TINY bit in the direction of your next frame. Take another photo!

  3. Continue making tiny adjustments and taking photos until your characters have “acted out” the entire story. You’re going to end up with a ton of photos. Take your time. Moving too quickly or shaking the camera are two of the most common mistakes in Claymation.

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Still Interested? Take a look at these resources: 

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Article: Instructables

What You'll Need: 

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or

Bring Clay Figures to Life!

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How to Set the Stage:

  • Choose a space to film. If you have a backdrop or items that will be in the scene, set them up in the filming space.

  • Point your camera toward the area you’re filming. It is very important that your camera is stable and doesn’t shake or move while you take pictures. If you don’t have a tripod, make a secure space for your camera to sit with a paper cup, binder clips, or other objects.

  • Point a lamp at the space where you’re filming. Keeping the lighting bright and consistent throughout the film with make your video much better.

  • Turn off your camera’s flash. Take a few sample photos. How do they look? Is it bright enough?

Activity 6: Save and Submit

 

Your Claymation masterpiece is still in progress, but you can still submit your work for this module!

Choose four to eight photographs which show different parts of your story and upload them. If you want, you can also upload a picture of the storyboard you made.

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Stop-motion animators use a term called “frames per second” to determine how many photos they need to take for each second of action in their stories. Professional stop motion animators might take 24 photos for every second of action (that’s 24 frames per second) while amateurs are more likely to take 12 photos for every second of action (12 frames per second). You could even animate in 3 frames per second, but it’s going to look a little choppier. The more pictures you use per second, the more smooth your animation will seem.

 

When you’ve taken all of your photos, you can learn how to turn them into a movie with the Producing Stop Motion Animation Module.


If you want to learn more about frames per second, watch this video.

To share your video online, you could upload it to Vimeo with the following information:

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Email the digital media you created to BGCAmediamaking@gmail.com or send it through instagram to @BGCAmediamaking 

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