PRACTICING WITH THE CAMERA SLIDER RIG

STOP MOTION CAMERA SLIDER TEST from crazy chris on Vimeo.

MY FIRST TEENY TINY SHORT FILM

Well...I got a wild hair tonight and decided to make a short little film...did all the animation and editing in about 5 hours...lol

Enjoy!

WORKING ON A LATEX BUILD UP PUPPET

I've been dabbling with a new character... no name yet The head is made from clay... but the hands and feet are liquid latex build up method...and the rest will be covered in foam padding...cut to shape and clothes added

FIXING THE CAMERA SHAKE SITUATION

So I think i may have fixed the camera shake issue. Basically it is important that every element of the shoot be attached to the stage base. This way, much like a helmet cam, every element moves in unison when the floor dips or shakes. So when I finally paint my sky background it will hang directly off a wooden ledge built on the backstage of my stage rig, allowing it to move in unison If you watch the tripod in the background you can see it jump a couple times. this is because it is resting on the floor and not attached to the stage rig


So here is how i did it

I took 2 side by side 2x12's and clamped them to a lower shelf (i may add 2 more on top of these to stabalize it even more if i find there is a little shake later on)

I then had to figure out a way to stabalize the legs of the tripod....and then it hit me... BOTTLE CAPS!!! Check it out!! Once i figured out exactly where i wanted the tripod legs i simply screwed a bottle cap into the spot and VOILA!

 

PRETTY PROUD OF THAT!! HAHAHA

ATTEMPTING A WALK (NOT TOO GOOD)

I attempted a walk and noticed that the camera / tripod was shaking slightly from shot to shot due to the loose wooden floor i work on... so now back to the drawing boards about camera placement...sigh

SET UPDATE

Well I've been dabbling a bit more on the set. I am now leaning towards an open meadow instead of a park bench scenerio. My mind keeps changing! But here's how it's going so far

Here I have foamed some shrubbery and the trunks for the trees . The tree trunks are later shaved down to shape before painting

 

This is how my hillside background attaches

 

Laying down grass.Notice i used a piece of pvc pipe to give the grass a little raise in the eye line. Also notice my hillside has been painted a lighter green which i ended up hating and changing

Here are the trees and shrubs added... trees were fastened down with screws. Notice I changed the hillside color yet again. I may remove the hillside all together and just paint something on the sky backdrop when it's completed.

 

BUILDING A MAGNET RIG

Working on concepts for a magnetic rig mount using a "magic arm" with clamp and small rare earth magnets glued to the end

So far it works great as a stabilizer for 12'' action figures

I then super glued a washer to the front and back of the action figure then applied glue to a magnet and it was easily held in place until the glue dried solid!

The rig will be set at a perfect height to join the two magnets together