Guide to Making a Stop-Motion Video

Introduction to Stop-Motion Animation

Stop-motion is a unique filmmaking technique that allows you to make your own movies by using a conventional digital camera and many individual pictures. A movie, in essence, is a bunch of frames (pictures) strung together and played back at 24 to 30 frames per second (fps). The higher the frame rate, the smoother the action will appear in the final movie.

A stop-motion films works the same way. Numerous pictures (frames) are shot with subtle changes between adjacent frames. When played in its entirety, the frame to frame changes convey motion. Like an animated cartoon, the animator must draw out each frame with minor changes.

Make a Stop-Motion Video using These Tips

Get Organized: Have an Outline of Your Ideas

The very first step to any movie is creating an outline and/or storyboard. Visualize the action and how you want the movie to look like. If you can’t clearly visualize it, how do you plan to shoot it?

Determine How Long You Want Each Scene to Be

By gauging the length of each scene and the frame rate of the movie, you can estimate the number of frames you will need for each scene. Say you want the movie to be a smooth 15fps. That means for a 10 second scene, you will need to shoot 150 frames!

Give Yourself Plenty of Time

Plan ahead. For the sake of continuity, shoot each scene in its entirety before taking a break or coming back. The extra effort will show in the final movie. By allowing more time for your project, you also minimize the chance of making mistakes which will be very apparent from frame to frame.

Use a Tripod and NEVER Move the Camera

An absolute must for stop-motion is the use of a tripod. Setting the camera on a table is just not going to cut it. Any slight bumps or shifts in camera position will completely kill the flow of your animation.

Keep Your Exposure and Lighting Consistent

If your camera has it, use the manual mode (M on the dial). Manually set your aperture, shutter speed, ISO, and white balance and lock it down. As previously stated, subtle changes will stick out! The same goes for lighting, shoot in a consistent environment, preferably with artificial lighting since natural lighting has a tendency to change throughout the day, both in intensity and direction.
Read more: http://www.brighthub.com/multimedia/video/articles/64948.aspx#ixzz0gap2cnEU

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Here are some examples of Stop-Motion clips:

Painted-On Hand Animals

In fourth grade, everyone I know used to draw a mustache on their pointer fingers. By bending the finger underneath their noses, these kids could make it look just like they had a mustache. We’ve come a long way from that time. Mustaches are great and all, but it’s just cooler to have an entire elephant. These hand paintings are the top of the line.

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see more over at: http://www.interbent.com/painted-on-hand-animals/

Incredible photos of animals

We would like to present 70+ great photos of almost each species of animals. Collection of photos of pets, as well as photos of completely wild animals. Amazing!

Via http://en.tspot.pl/news/70-incredible-photos-animals/

Free Dark Grungy Fonts and Textures

Grunge fonts and textures are used in a wide range of web and graphic designs.

 

There is much less of a limit when it comes to using these elements, and they’re a great way to make any of your web, graphic, or print designs stand-out. Some of these fonts or textures may seem useless as a standalone, however, once meshed with a beautiful idea, who knows what can happen.

Here we have a collection of over 50 dark grungy fonts and textures for you to use any way you’d like!

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head over to download at :  http://designreviver.com/freebies/50-free-dark-grungy-fonts-and-textures/

A Free Sophisticated Premium Peel Over Icon Set

Someone over at creativenerds has been working on a load of icon sets over the past couple weeks, this is one of the great icon sets we have made available to download exclusively from Creative Nerds.  18 high quality icons for you to download which are available to be used within commercial and non commercial design projects.

head over here to download:  http://creativenerds.co.uk/freebies/a-free-sophisticated-premium-peel-over-icon-set/

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Truly Stunning Examples of HDR Photography

High dynamic range imaging (HDRI or just HDR) is a set of techniques that allow a greater dynamic range of luminance between the lightest and darkest areas of an image than standard digital imaging techniques or photographic methods. This wider dynamic range allows HDR images to more accurately represent the wide range of intensity levels found in real scenes, ranging from direct sunlight to faint starlight. Today, we are showing you 35 Truly Stunning Examples of HDR Photography. I appreciate to all those talented photographers who captured these excellent pictures with their efforts, imaginations and creativity to give us a chance to see these creative wonders from their creative eyes. This list is not long in numbers but I promise you that when you start browsing them in details it will surely refresh you. These are the wonder creations of photographer who used their creativity with a different angle and approach to get the result that makes a difference.

read and see more over at : http://www.smashingapps.com/2010/02/21/35-truly-stunning-examples-of-hdr-photography.html

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The Many Faces of Nazaury Delgado

Nazaury Delgado is a digital artist from the Bronx who uses Photoshop to create evocative and surreal images.

He begins the process with a photograph of himself or others, which he then overlays with another photo collage. The entire composition is then faded together to make the final product.

Delgado is nineteen years old and is currently attending the Fashion Institute of Technology on a full scholarship.

While he was a participant in an arts program for at-risk teens in the Bronx, Delgado’s teachers were amazed when they saw the digital photographs that he had created on his iPod Touch.

One of them, Neil Waldman, said of his art that “There are some people who have an innate ability to create spectacle, something innate that you can’t teach.”

In this post, we’ve compiled some of his most exceptional works that are sure to inspire you… Further information and links can be found below the image collection.

For more stunning Art work from  Nazaury Delgado,  head over here: http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2010/02/the-many-faces-of-nazaury-delgado/

Creating brochures: 12 step-by-step Photoshop tutorials

Creating brochures is a lot tougher than most people think. If you are new to graphic design, there are actually a number of things that you need to consider before conceptualizing a brochure design. First of all, you need to ask your client what he wants to accomplish with the brochure, know the target audience as well as the message of the brochure. Next, you need to get the specifications of the brochure such as size of paper, stock type, trimming, folding, or special cuts as  as these will depend on the budget of the client for the brochure.

To get you started with the design, we decided to gather in a single post 12 very helpful and easy-to-follow tutorials on creating brochures mostly in Photoshop and some in Adobe Indesign. At the end of the post, we also featured some really amazing brochure design examples for inspiration.

Creating Brochures 01-Design a Ready to Print Brochure in Photoshop
This Photoshop Tutorial from PSDTuts will help you create a ready to print three-fold brochure from scratch using only Photoshop. This tutorial is ideal for beginners and for people who want to know more about print design.

read more at: http://bestdesignoptions.com/?p=10081

50 Freelance Job Sites For Designers & Programmers.

Being a freelancer can be extremely advantageous and it is probably a dream for many designers and developers. Not only you get to choose the job you are really interested in, you also have total flexibility in terms of time, whom you want to work with and where you want to work at.

Read more: http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/50-freelance-job-sites-for-designers-programmers-best-of/

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Here is a small selection of the jobsites that can be found over at hongkiat.com:

http://forums.digitalpoint.com/forumdisplay.php?s=beff28e9e1d81b95c5a6698cd6a1de4e&f=24

Aside from being a very useful forum for webmaster, Digitalpoint is also an extremely strategic place where you can outsource work and seek relevant freelance professionals.

http://jobs.smashingmagazine.com/

A great thing about posting your job at this site is that the jobs listed here are soon featured among one of the top 20 blogs of the world. This is again a nice job portal to find programming and designing jobs, besides all others.

http://www.elance.com/

A famous online portal for freelancers, this is an ultimate place to meet professionals with business, technical and marketing expertise to get work done at an affordable price.

http://www.odesk.com/w/

Since its inception in 2004, this online marketplace truly embarked a revolution in the way world works. It’s win-win approach for both service providers and employers with meaningful work as well as top-flight talent, makes it an asset for both parties. Average size of a job here is $5,000.

http://www.freelancer.com/

Bag a project or post a project on this platform to get the best bids from gamut of skilled web designers, copywriters or freelance programmers. Provide work or get work at the best prices. Sign up today as a work provider or a work seeker. A word of caution – Stay alert before trusting anyone as there are a lot many fraudsters as well, on both sides.

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Fantastic Examples Of Origami Art Work

Origami,from oru meaning “folding“, and kami meaning “paper” is the traditional Japanese art of paper folding. The goal of this art is to create a representation of an object using geometric folds and crease patterns preferably without gluing or cutting the paper, and using only one piece of paper. In modular origami several identical units are combined to form a figure.

The number of basic origami folds is small, but they can be combined in a variety of ways to make intricate designs. The most well known form is probably the Japanese paper crane. In general, these designs begin with a square sheet of paper whose sides may be different colors or prints. Contrary to most popular belief, traditional Japanese origami, which has been practiced since the Edo era (1603–1867), has often been less strict about these conventions, sometimes cutting the paper during the creation of the design-this is then called kirigami.

via http://designbeep.com/2010/02/07/50-fantastic-examples-of-origami-art-work/