Submitting photographs to websites like Flickr is a great way to showcase your work but Flickr has added the ability to upload videos as well. Uploading videos to websites is not a new thing, You tube being probably the most popular, but photo websites such as Flickr have now caught up. Advancements in digital camera design mean that nowadays it is possible to shoot still images as well as video using the same camera and with manufacturers now producing camera’s with high definition capability the future for the amateur photographer/film maker looks very good indeed.

Although new camera’s such as the Canon EOS 5D mark II can shoot high quality video the ability to make a film is still possible to those who cannot afford to buy the latest technology.

Many moons ago when photography was in its infancy it was discovered that if you string lots of photos together and then played them at a specific speed then a film you would have. This technique became known as Stop Motion. Wikipedia describes Stop motion as “a technique to make a physically manipulated object appear to move on its own”. The first example of this technique is credited to E Smith and J Stuart Blackton for their film “humpty dumpty circus” in 1898.

Since then Stop motion has been used time and time again in television and film. Everyone could probably give an example of at least one film or television programme that has used stop motion as the technique is now widely used and very familiar to most. Famous films such as Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Terminator and Wallace and gromit have all used stop motion techniques. Although technology in the form of advanced software is able to assist the stop motion animator, traditional techniques are still being used and the best example of this is the recent adaptation of Roald Dahl’s “Mr Fox”.

Having been interested in film making since studying drama and theatre arts at school I have always wanted to produce my own stop motion film. My first video camera had the ability to shoot frame by frame but I never had the editing capabilities that were required to finish it off. Having worked hard earlier this year I was able to pay for a computer to be custom built to my specification and this along with a DSLR has now enabled me to dip my toes into the world of Stop Motion animation.

Rather than delve straight into a lengthy drawn out project I decided to learn the basics first and begin by making a short animation of about 1 minute. 1 minute may not sound long but the amount of photographs needed to fill this time frame would be in the region of approx 130 pictures.

So to begin:

First of all I knew that the process of stop motion would be very time consuming so I wanted to shoot the whole sequence within a couple of hours. My main reason for trying to shoot within a couple of hours was a way of disciplining myself to start and finish shooting within a given time frame. After shooting the sequence I knew that the editing process would take longer so with this in mind I knew that camera settings would be crucial.

The story:

Every good film needs a story but as mine would be more like a clip I decided to concentrate on cohesion rather than telling a tale. The stories would come later but for now I had a lot to learn; and practicing techniques was more important at this stage. Having searched for subject matter I was drawing a blank but then I noticed my little boys toy soldiers and immediately I had a flash of inspiration. I decided that my clip would show some soldiers on manoeuvres.

The shoot:

The location for the shoot was to be my dining table as it was large enough to accommodate the amount of soldiers and was ideally placed next to a large window which would be crucial for good lighting. A few overcast days halted shooting but the sun soon shone and then I set to work.

Setting up the soldiers into their start positions took longer than I expected; nearly an hour, as some of them kept falling over, so my time frame of a couple of hours was beginning to look doubtful. With the soldiers finally ready I then positioned my Manfrotto tripod at the end of the table and set my Canon EOS 450D to the following settings.

·         3 mega pixels ( I wanted to keep file sizes small)

·         Daylight White Balance (filters could be added in post production)

·         Mirror lock up ( helps to limit any vibrations)

·         2 second timer (steadies the camera)

·         ISO 200

·         Manual focusing ( allows for precise focusing)

With the camera on the tripod and my exposure settings dialled in using Manual mode I was ready to begin the shoot. For every shot I would move an individual soldier to a new position and sometimes this involved moving more than one soldier before another shot was taken. After nearly 2 hours and with many moves recorded I had finally got the shots in the bag.

Post Production:

To edit the many pictures I decided to save time by creating an action using Photoshop CS2 that would take care of resizing the images in batches of approx thirty. I also took the decision to desaturate the images for a black and white look; this was also done at the same time as resizing. Once the images were sharpened and saved I was then ready to link them all together using Windows Movie Maker.

With all the images positioned on the time line I then had to alter the time span that each image would be displayed. It worked out to approx 3 pictures per second which seemed to fit the beat of the piece of music that I had chosen to accompany the film.

Using the time saving actions in Photoshop really helped to speed things up and having used Windows Movie Maker before to make a slide show of photographs the film was soon finished.

With the film now ready for viewing I asked my fiancé to be the first to see it and to give her opinions. After watching the film my fiancé surprised me by saying “bloody brilliant”. During the shooting of the film my fiancé did not show any interest in what I was doing and even passed me a wry smile or two; but now she has eaten humble pie and likes it so much that she has put it on her facebook for all her friends to see.

Summing Up:

This project has been more enjoyable than I thought it would be and although I know that my short film is not going to break box office records it has encouraged me to make another.

May I now take this opportunity to present to you “Manouvres”.