Lens

On many stop motion websites it suggests that you use an old style lens rather than a new one, as the new ones can result in light flickering.

"The lenses that are supplied with modern DSLRs use automatic iris. This means the lens is normally 'wide open' to let the maximum amount of light through to the viewfinder making it easier for you to see your composition. When you click the shutter release, the lens iris 'stops down', the shutter opens, after the set exposure time, the shutter closes and the lens iris opens up again.

Unfortunately the lens does not 'stop down' to exactly the same place each time you press the shutter. For normal picture taking this is not a problem, but for animation it causes an annoying flicker.

To solve this problem, the best solution is to use older style manual iris lenses, not to use the lenses that usually come bundled with the new DSLR cameras.  The lens on this page is a manual iris/aperture lens. You can tell by the aperture "f-stop" markings on the movable ring on the lens barrel.  Look for this stepping ring with similarly marked increments when considering a lens." 

(http://www.stopmotionpro.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=84:dslr-lenses&catid=12)

To avoid this problem, I found some old lenses for a film SLR that I had at home, and bought a cheap adapter. Now I have a  manual 28mm prime lens mounted onto my SLR, so I should have no light flicker. 

Test 4, walking

I actually did this before the particle test, but forgot to upload it.

Here I encountered many problems;
needing to mask out the base so that it looked like he was walking on the desk
needing to mask out the pole - keeps getting hidden behind legs
basically using alot of masks
and the movement doesn't match with how fast he's actually walking.

Therefore, I need to paint the base and the pole green in the hope that they will be got rid of at the same time as the green screen, I need to make sure that the pole is never in front of his legs in the shot and I need to pay way more attention to the speed that I am making him move at

Test 3; Motion tracking & particles

This test involved me creating another little bit of stop motion, and learning how to motion track. It took some time because I was tracking the tip of the brush which disappears behind his head at some points, so I had to manually move the tracking points until the whole track followed the right path. It still could do with some adjustments, however when creating these shots I will now be more aware of what I need, and can shoot with motion tracking in mind so that the brush doesn't go out of shot again.

Additionally, I created a basic particle effect and parented it to the motion track, so that it looks like it's following the brush. I really like this, however it doesn't look much like paint. Therefore I have decided that in addition to particles such as these, I will create brush strokes on canvas in photoshop, and reveal them with the stroke tool so it looks like it has actually been painted onto the canvas.

Storyboards

These are my rough storyboards for my animation. I have tried to include all of the shots that I have planned so far.
The middle section where he is painting will be done in a montage style, and the first and the last shots will be live action.

Self Portrait inspiration

I have also been thinking about what the mannequin should paint. Recently I am thinking more and more that it should be a representation of my as a "digital artist" to an extent, and therefore I think the picture should show me creating some digital effects.

One portrait which has inspired me to think this is a self portrait by Artemisia Gentileschi called Self Portrait as the Allegory of Painting. Gentileschi was the first female to have a self portrait in a royal collection, and I think the significance of this lies in the fact that it is showing herself at work. 

2nd test, woody paints

Learned how to chroma key out the green, placed a random image in the background just to show that it has actually been done. I like the movement, but I think it's too shaky still, so I will aim for a smoother movement when I do it for real.

This is just to prove that it was shot on a green screen 

1st Test Animation using StopMotionPro

After doing some research into stop motion, I discovered one of the first and still most widely used softwares for this type of animation is Stop Motion Pro. This is the software used to make the amazing Wallace and Gromit animations.
So I figured while I could take the pictures and import them all into After Effects, acquiring Stop Motion Pro and being able to use tools such as onion skinning, and being able to see an instant playback of my animation would help me way more. So here is my first test using this programme, apologies for the quality, so far I have only been able to get it to export the movie straight to youtube.