Amateur animators getting started

Surfer · 17 Jun 2013 at 20:28

Hey. my nephew is into this. Hey messes about with plasticine and creates whole stories out of it a la Morph (from old Tony Hart show)

He reallt likes doing this. any ideas how he could progress this as a career?

DailyGeek · 17 Jun 2013 at 20:31

Like anything creative, start to archive his work so he can see his own progress and then start the pick the best parts to build a portfolio. Youtube or Vimeo would be a sensible place to store things obviously.

Surfer · 17 Jun 2013 at 20:33

Its his birthday coming up anything i can get him to help?

bJN · 17 Jun 2013 at 20:41

Well for starters, how old is he?

Surfer · 17 Jun 2013 at 20:54

13

He has a laptop so i thought about animation software? But thelaptop is pretty crapola.

DailyGeek · 17 Jun 2013 at 21:05

Any imaging software that supports stop motion would be a good start if he wants to do claymation type stuff. Corel VideoStudio X5 for example.

Surfer · 17 Jun 2013 at 21:25

Ahh great thanks. do u need a hefty pc to run it?

bloodiedathame · 17 Jun 2013 at 23:56

As an animator myself (though not stop motion), just encouragement is probably best. Some decent software will help. Top of the line is Dragonframe though there are plenty of others out there. Something that has camera control and onion skinning is best. Also learning traditional animation (ie stick man) will help him get timings and movements bette. There are so many parts of the art, it's just a case of practice, patience and being totally aware and observant of movement.

Somnambulist · 17 Jun 2013 at 23:59

The Animators Survival Kit (book by Richard Williams).