EMPIRE STRIKES BACK Additional Animation Footage

y3a

So, you are doing MANUAL "Go Motion" ?

Weequay

This is amazing mate.

I Long for someone to make a science fiction film using traditional FX techniques including stop mo.

Will you be shooting and editing on digital? If so can you eleborate on the tech set up you will be using please please please!! As a geek I would love to know the start tpo finish process!

Oh and if I one day do realise my dream of setting up and running a film company dedicated to producing independant films utilising traditional fx techniques..... you will be heading up the stop mo division

EDIT: As above, will you be going for stop mo and adding motion blur digitally? or will this be actual go motion?? Would love to know the tech details!
Weequay

Lutso

This is sensational. I cannot WAIT to see your finished demo reel. I'll bet it will blow away the CGI crap used today.

Now that George Lucas has flown the coop, I'm glad we have people like you around to preserve film history and traditional techniques.

FANTAMATION

Thanks so much guys for all the awesome words of support and interest, it really does keep me going!!

To answer the questions, yes I'll be doing stop-motion with just a tad of digital motion blur. I'll probably also try a little bit of "manual" go-motion just to see how it turns out but I don't want to get bogged down with that as much since I can use the computer for the slight blurring therefore eliminating one time consuming element. I'm gonna shoot using a Canon 40D camera along with using the Dragon stop-mo program.

Again, thank you everyone who's been following this, I know it's slow going but I'm gonna try my damndest to make it worth the wait and also thank you all so much who still believe that traditional effects are the best!!!

Merry Xmas, Happy Holidays and a better New Year for everyone

christrom

I have seen numerous digital motion blur tests added on to traditional stop motion effects and the results have always been incredible: All the personality of stop motion with the finesse of digital animation to iron out the kinks.


This is a perfect example:

Jason and the argonauts loop. NOT FULL SCENE. - YouTube

Good luck and Merry Christmas!

steveo

Wow!! That is awesome! I foresee someone doing this with all the stop mo in Star Wars. I want to animate again.

Weequay

Wonderful! Can you post some more footage please??!!!

DId you render the whole scene? would love to see it as well as some before and after conmparisons

weequay

Ghost Host

Jeez, that's amazing... I love the look of it! ...and I'm a purist!

xmr1

Wow, I never thought it's THAT different...Beats every cgi!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vbkl...e_gdata_player

Really looking forward your animations!

FANTAMATION

Well, after getting caught up a bit on my commissioned work, I've finally been able to squeeze in a little work on the Wampa puppet. I've got the head sculpt mostly finished, I still have to adjust it in some places but you can at least get the idea. Keep in mind that I'm basing this on the Phil Tippet hand puppet.

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ironkamakaze

sweet. stop motion rocks

FANTAMATION

Ok, finally got the head molded and cast as well as the hands, the head is resin (I have yet to attach the lower jaw since I ran out of super glue) and the hands are of course silicone. I've already cast multiple heads so as to have an open mouth head, a closed mouth head, and I'm also gonna have a head with a slightly moveable jaw so I can get a little mouth movement. The hands are different colors cuz I was experimenting with my pigments and the hands are gonna be painted anyway. Sorry bout the contrasty, bright head but the resin just bounces light like crazy, I'll be taking pics of course after I throw some paint on everything. I also tweaked the head sculpt a tiny bit just to clean it up a tad before I molded it, so it'll look a bit better once it's painted.
Next step, begin foaming and shaping the body.

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steveo

Wampa's looking good. I hope Hollywood starts using this technique more and gets away from CGI. With a good animator behind these creatures, they look more realistic than CGI.

FANTAMATION

You said it brotha!!!!! From your mouth to Hollywoods deaf ear! Throughout my 20 plus year career in feature film visual effects I was always an advocate for stop-mo and the traditional "in-camera" effects during the cg revolution (takeover), and my response was always the same........ "cg takes less time and is less expensive". So it was inevitably this attitude in Hollywood that made me quit the "big time" and forced me to transition the fun factor of visual effects back into the garage where I plan on having a ball proving them wrong!

VinceRaptor

This is coming along really nicely! Keep up the great work! Being a star wars fan myself I cant wait to see this all come together!

Colin Droidmilk

Uh... what do you mean 'kinks'? The lack of blur, the strobe effect is part of the whole magic of stop-motion. Harryhausen himself recognised it, rightfully attributing stop-motion's dreamlike quality to the strobe effect, to the lack of blur. It's why Dragonslayer was dull to me. It just looked too much like boring old reality - as do these blur-added skeletons in this clip... as kids, me and my brother used to play at acting out stop-motion fights from Harryhausen films where we'd actually try to put the strobe effect, the jerking lack of blur, into our body motions. It's what stop motion is all about for crying out loud!

christrom

It is if you wish to preserve it as an artform and it definitely has its own aesthetic, but for people wishing to convey reality I think the motion blur builds on already great animation.

FANTAMATION

Hey,finally was able to take a little break from the isle of Colossa and get back to the planet of Hoth, where I've gotten the foam blocking done and now will start to pelt the Wampa up..... finessing the body dimensions as I go.

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Scott Graham

Interesting technique. I'm looking forward to seeing you do this. Nice and simple with the body, eh?

FANTAMATION

Same technique used by Marcel Delgado, Harryhausen's early puppets, Jim Danforth, etc. Simple and effective!

kev1969

As a huge stop motion fan this looks awsome.

christrom

Just thinking - It is going to be tricky animating the Wampa with the fur in case the fur shifts around too much between frames. It may be an idea to have several locations where you can add a pin to stick into the main body. That way you can animate without touching the fur. Looking great so far

Guy Cowen

Hurry up n knock this out of the park mate, cant wait to see the Wampa with a coat on

FANTAMATION

Christrom- It's a nice thought but unfortunately there's no real way of being able to stick pins or little rods or anything into the puppet to be able to make tiny, controlled, accurate, incremental moves. The only way to do that is to physically take hold of the puppet, the trick is going to just being careful where to actually take hold of the puppet when making the movements and to try and not disturb the fur as much as possible.
What you were thinking of was more along the lines of an actual "rod- puppet" which utilizes a much looser jointed armature and would've been great to do if I were shooting the Wampa as a separate element without stop-motion, great idea though!!

Guy- He'll be furred up this week buddy, thanks for hangin in there with me!!!

vaderdarth

Fantamation, I think he means mini pins or handles on the rear of the wampa to move his body and arms etch.........which would keep from touching the hair. I've seen that setup on stop motion puppets before too. Only problem with it, keeping the pins out of the shots. I suppose you could wrap in blue or green.....green screen it.