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If you are a parent, you’re probably always on the hunt for weekend ideas that would be both fun and educational for your children. And if it happens to be a rainy weekend (or just another weekend during a global pandemic), that means you might need to come up with a scenario for indoors.
As if being a parent wasn’t challenging enough!
Luckily, there are plenty of DIY activities you’ll surely enjoy with your kids. And if you’ve tried our guides to making a teepee tent, drawing, and crafting, the next step is to go digital and create a real stop-motion animated movie!
Don’t worry, this DIY idea doesn’t involve much screen time. In fact, 90% of the process will be devoted to the scenario and “stage-setting”. It’s also much easier than it sounds! But the most important part, this DIY idea is a great way to spark creativity in your little Spielberg, and we promise you both are going to enjoy the experience.
Below we’ll talk a bit about the process of creating stop-motion animation and share a few ideas for making a stop-motion video with things you surely have in the house.
What is stop-motion animation?
In a nutshell, stop-motion animation is just a bunch of photos of the same object stitched together into a timelapse video.
To understand the concept better, imagine that every photo is a movie frame. This means for every picture, you’ll need to make a micro change in the object’s position, so when you watch their sequence at high speed, it feels as if the object is moving by itself.
In most animations, objects either move around (i.e. a toy “walking” from point A to point B) or change their shape or appearance (i.e. a piece of paper that gets wrapped into origami).
How to create a stop-motion animation?
Before you begin, you should prepare to make a couple of hundreds of photos. It may sound intimidating, but it is actually faster than it sounds, especially if you’re going to do that with your little helpers.
Once you come up with an idea for your video, you’ll need to prepare the “stage” and the props. Next, stabilize your camera either in front of the stage or above it. Note that camera movements aren’t allowed during the photoshoot, otherwise the frame will look different and the animation effect might be ruined.
Once ready, place the props in the starting position and make your first photo. Then make a micro-change in the position of the object you’re shooting and take another photo. Repeat as many times as needed to get to the end of your scenario. Remember that the smaller the changes are – the more photos you’ll need, and the smoother the animation will look. You can also try an animated video backgrounds.
You can ask your child to take the responsibility either for moving the props or for taking pictures. Although, depending on their age, of course, they still might need your supervision.
Once you finish the photoshoot, it’s time to stitch pictures together. To do that, you’ll need video editing software. For Windows, consider using VSDC Free Video Editor. For Mac, iMovie is a perfect tool available for free (and it will also work on your iPad).
Once you’re ready, follow these steps:
- Upload the pictures you took to the computer
- Import them to the video editor of your choice
- Set the frame rate for your animation
- Add background music or voiceover
- Save the video to your computer
This is a very generic list of steps, and of course you’ll have to poke around your video editing software to figure out how to stitch pictures and set the frame rate.
If you’re on Mac, here is a detailed video guide to creating a stop-motion animation in iMovie.
If you’re on Windows, here is a detailed guide to creating a stop-motion video in VSDC.
Now, if you’re new to video editing, one thing that might sound unfamiliar to you is the frame rate. Here is what it means in this context.
What is frame rate?
Frame rate is an expression used to define the number of frames per second in a video. When it comes to stop-motion animation, a frame rate is essentially the number of photos displayed per second. The higher the frame rate is, the smoother (and more realistic) the animation will look.
However, to achieve a higher frame rate, you’ll also need to take more pictures. For example, the minimum recommended frame rate for stop-motion animation is 10 frames per second. This means you’ll need to take 300 pictures to have a 30-second video. If you decide to increase the frame rate to 20 fps, your resulting video will be even shorter – just 15 seconds!
Ideas for shooting a stop-motion video with kids
Now that you’re practically a stop-motion video expert, let’s look at some popular animation ideas your children will enjoy.
- Lego
Build anything and capture the process or animate Lego toys and let them move in a video on their own.
- Clay
Clay is a fantastic material to use for a stop-motion video. Capture the process of making anything out of clay or use play dough as an alternative.
- Candy
You can have a lot of fun with candy. Capture the process of unwrapping a candy or move M&M’s around the table.
- Paper
Paper is a popular material often used in animated movies. Tear a piece of paper apart, make a ball or origami, draw or write on it.
- Food
Finally, if you don’t have Lego, clay, or candy in the house, you surely have some food! Think out of the box and come up with a scenario where food moves around the table, gets chopped or cooked!
There should be no limit to your imagination. But if you need more inspiration, just search for stop-motion videos on the Internet.
Go ahead and try this for yourself
Seeing the result of your first movie project is very satisfying. And for your children, who are probably hard to surprise at this point, animation might be a terrific way to realize their creative skills and spend quality time with you.
Definitely brag-worthy!
