1st Draft- Room Animation

For this animation I used the normal stop motion technique, of photographing the scene then altering something. I used my bedroom for the subject then photographed it roughly 450 times portraying the movement of it being tidied. I then put all the pictures into a film format so one image would follow another in quick succession. I altered things such as the bed getting made, clothes folding themselves, and CD's being arranged. Even though these are very minor adjustments I feel they were effective due to the detail. I am pleased with the outcome as everything runs smoothly, and there are not many things I would change if I were to do it again. The only main issue I had was with the camera positioning, as because of the awkward angles I used I photographed without a tri-pod. I don't feel this let the animation down as the images were still quite fluid and the jerkiness of the images reflected the hand held photography. However I would still like to experiment by using a tri-pod to see the difference it would make.
Another thing I would change is how the duration of each photograph. I used Windows Movie Maker to string the shots together but I think the next animation I make I will use Final Cut Pro so I have more control over effects and the time line. I feel that the beginning and last shot should have been longer to show the before and after, but if I slowed down the entire contents of the film then it makes the images jerkiness more pronounced. This was the main issue I had, but I feel that doing this has still been beneficial as I known not to make the same mistake in my final piece. Something I particularly liked about the animation is when the DVD cases have the discs slip into them then close and find themselves back in their places. I think this was successful because the camera was so steady and because quite a lot of shots were used for it.
I have found that stop motion is quite a tedious medium of media and it takes a lot of work for quite a small outcome. However I find it very interesting as there are many different options available as your only limitation is your creativity. This is shown in my research for this animation as another animator has made things move up walls and gravity defying places by sticking them there with blutac and such, which is quite imaginative and makes his animation different from other peoples. I would quite like to do this animation again in my own time to see how much could be improved and so that I too could think of imaginative and unique ways of making my animation successful and memorable.