The Future of Stop-Motion

This year marked the occurrence of an unusual phenomenon at the Academy Awards. This year out of the five films nominated for the Best Animated Feature Award, three of them were stop motion films. Frankenweenie, The Pirates! and Paranorman were nominated, though of course Brave won. Stop motion is a technique which uses models of varying scales and a camera in order to create a moving image. The model is moved slightly between each photo, up to 20 times a second. This is an intensely labourious process, and it can take a week to produce a minute of film.

One of the most famous and celebrated stop motion films is the Nightmare Before Christmas, which is responsible for popularizing the genre and which remains one of the most influential stop motion pictures to this day. The technique provides a distinct look, and adds depth and grounds the animation. There is also generally a quirkiness to stop-motion, and i do not think there is a single stop-motion film which can be accused of being generic, as the films often have unique visual identities and stunning cinematography, it is also a more flexible form of animation, in that it is easier to visualise the sets and the characters,

and easier to visualize the shot than with regular hand drawn animation, where pans and wipes are rarely used.

These films often have darker and more adult stories than regular animated films, they are also normally originals, and are rarely adaptations of fairy tales such as are typical animated films. The reason for their darker themes in my opinion is twofold. Firstly the influence of Tim Burton's work on this sub genre cannot be understated, and The Nightmare Before Christmas remains hugely influential. Secondly the technique of stop-motion lends itself to this kind of story, as the animation tends to look a little more jerky and less smooth, and thus is appropriate for this kind of subject.
 
3D is a technique that is being used more and more with stop-motion, with 'Nightmare' being the first film to be converted to 3D in post production, with subsequent films such as Frankenweenie also using conversion therapy to add a 3D effect. Paranorman on the other hand was shot in 3D, using a specialized rig which moved the camera after each photo, thus taking an identical photo but with slightly different perspective for each photo taken, and it is perhaps the first stop-motion film to be shot in 3D. Paranorman and Coraline also pioneered the use of 3D printers for printing faces, diminishing sculpting time.

Overall stop motion is a hugely exciting form of animation, and one which is only being enhanced with the use of computer generated imagery and 3D shooting. And it is a form of animation at which Tim Burton really does excel.