ABOUT ANIMATION
Animation is a technique for creating the illusion of live video using characters and scenery that are not in fact alive (i.e., inanimate). While live video is made up of multiple frames recorded in real time, animation is made up of multiple frames that were recorded one at a time, with the animator making tiny adjustments in the subjects between each take. When the frames are put together in rapid succession, the viewer gets the impression that inanimate objects have become “animated,” or alive. Animation is almost always used to tell some kind of story.
Animation covers a variety of techniques for producing video, but the core element of all of them is that it’s the animator bringing the subjects to life (often by repositioning them by hand), which means that the video could not have been produced simply by recording with a video camera. You can produce an effect similar to animation by recording with a video camera and then dropping frames, but that isn’t technically animation. Neither is time lapse photography or a sequence of photos taken of real time people or places.
APPROACHES
For our purposes, you may choose from one of these approaches to animation: animated objects (aka stop motion), animated drawings (such as cartoons), or animated words (aka kinetic typography).
Stop Motion:
A series of photos of inanimate objects that were repositioned in tiny increments to create the illusion that they’re “alive” and are moving or behaving with a purpose. Objects may include those that resemble people or animals, such as puppets, dolls, clay figures, toys, and so on, or any other object that might plausibly “come alive” in order to tell a story. Special tools needed: still camera and tripod.
Cartoons
A series of images that show small changes in position in order to create the illusion that the figures in the images are “alive” and are moving or behaving with a purpose. These images might come from scanned-in hand drawings, drawings made through digital input devices or iPads, or other kinds of figures created with a graphics app, assembled in rapid sequence in a video editor. You can also make “cartoons” using the animation tools in PowerPoint or Keynote, with figures you import into or create in those apps.
Typography
A series of images that show small changes in letters (position, color, size, shape) to create the illusion of words coming “alive” and moving across the screen with a purpose. Images can be made one at a time and assembled in rapid sequence or created using an app with a text animation tool.
COMPOSING TOOLS
You can produce all of these approaches by creating multiple still images, each with the slightest change in the characters, scenery, and/or words, and then assembling them in a video editor with each image set to last only a few seconds. This is pretty much your only option for stop motion, but other options for cartoons and kinetic typography include using apps capable of animating objects or words.
If you plan to animate on a computer, your options include presentation apps like PowerPoint and Keynote, pro-level motion apps like After Effects or Motion, or a variety of downloadable Mac or PC desktop apps that fill the gap between those options.
If you plan to animate on an iPad, you can find a wide variety of iOS animation apps. This is the easiest and least expensive way to create some very cool animations, provided you have access to an iPad, of course. In particular I recommend DoInk and StickMotion.
EXAMPLES
(under development)
- 10 Stories Beautifully Told with Animated Typography
WEB RESOURCES
(under development)
Also see the web resources on the Live Video page, as many of the strategies for live video also apply to animation.
- How stop motion is made
- Wikipedia article on Stop Motion
- Wikipedia article on PowerPoint Animation
- Wikipedia article on Computer Animation
- Wikipedia entry on Kinetic Typography
- Kinetic Typography Tutorial
- Brief Guide to Kinetic Typography
