stop motion with amn action figure need help

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DustinR

Member
I am about to attempt my first stop motion short, just something simple, but i was wondering if there is a certain way to shoot it so you dont realize the true size of the action figure. like a macro lens of some sort? thanks
Dustin
 
Just build a small set. No fancy lenses needed. look at objects in your house. Try creating objects set to scale to the small action figure or whatever you're using. For references, check out The Brothers Quay Collection (my favorite), the Secret Adventures of Tom Thumb, the Collected Shorts of Jan Svankmajer Vol 1, and the Collected Shorts of Jan Svankmajer Vol 2.

Jan Svankmajer is God to stop motion animators (Though the Brothers Quay are my personal favorite...Most of their personal stuff is dark, but they do more colorful animations. They make the Bacardi commercials, if i'm not mistaken...I know they've done some before anyway). If you haven't checked out his work, be sure to do so.
 
CrackerJap said:
Just build a small set. No fancy lenses needed. look at objects in your house. Try creating objects set to scale to the small action figure or whatever you're using. For references, check out The Brothers Quay Collection (my favorite), the Secret Adventures of Tom Thumb, the Collected Shorts of Jan Svankmajer Vol 1, and the Collected Shorts of Jan Svankmajer Vol 2.

Jan Svankmajer is God to stop motion animators (Though the Brothers Quay are my personal favorite...Most of their personal stuff is dark, but they do more colorful animations. They make the Bacardi commercials, if i'm not mistaken...I know they've done some before anyway). If you haven't checked out his work, be sure to do so.
Click to expand...
Didn't the Brothers Quay do the Tool videos?
 
I know that they inspired the Tool videos, but I don't think they actually made them. They did make two music videos for His Name is Alive, Michael Penn (Sean Penn's brother), and 16 Horsepower. They have also done some commercials for Nikon, MTV, Coca-Cola, Slurpee, and several other companies.
 
I think the most important thing about shooting miniatures that you want to appear full size is to stop down the camera. this isn't as big deal with the DVX, since it has smaller chips, but think about it in relative terms. The DoF is so shallow when shooting in macro that it makes it look like you are shooting a person with a film plane of an 8x10 camera. So stop down the camera, that will give you Deeper DoF and make things look more realistic.
 
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