Claymation
Claymation, sometimes called clay animation or plasticine animation, is one of many forms of
Traditional
Technique
Each object or character is sculpted from clay or other such similarly pliable material as plasticine, usually around a wire skeleton, called an armature, and then arranged on the set, where it is photographed once before being slightly moved by hand to prepare it for the next shot, and so on until the animator has achieved the desired amount of film. Upon playback, the viewer perceives the series of slightly changing, rapidly succeeding images as motion.
A consistent shooting environment is needed to maintain the illusion of continuity: objects must be consistently placed and lit.
Production
Producing a
The object must not be altered by accident, slight smudges, dirt, hair, or dust. Feature-length productions have generally switched from clay to rubber silicone and resin cast components: Will Vinton has dubbed one foam-rubber process "Foamation". Nevertheless, clay remains a viable animation material where a particular aesthetic is desired.
Types
Claymation can take several forms:
"Freeform" claymation is an informal term referring to the process in which the shape of the clay changes radically as the animation progresses, such as in the work of Eli Noyes and Ivan Stang's animated films. Clay can also take the form of "character" claymation, where the clay maintains a recognizable character throughout a shot,[3] as in Art Clokey's and Will Vinton's films.[4]
One variation of claymation is
Another clay-animation technique, one that blurs the distinction between stop motion and traditional flat animation, is called clay painting (also a variation of the direct manipulation animation process), wherein clay is placed on a flat surface and moved like wet oil paints (as on a traditional artist's canvas) to produce any style of images, but with a clay look to them.
A sub variation claymation can be informally called "clay melting".
The term "hot set" is used amongst animators during production. It refers to a set where an animator is filming. The clay characters are set in a perfect position where they can continue shooting where they left off. If an animator calls his set a "hot set," then no one is allowed to touch the set or else the shoot would be ruined. Certain scenes must be shot rather quickly. If a scene is left unfinished and the weather is perhaps humid, then the set and characters have an obvious difference. The clay puppets may be deformed from the humidity or the air pressure could have caused the set to shift slightly. These small differences can create an obvious flaw to the scene. To avoid these disasters, scenes normally have to be shot in one day or less.
History
William Harbutt developed plasticine in 1897. To promote his educational "Plastic Method" he made a handbook that included several photographs that displayed various stages of creative projects. The images suggest phases of motion or change, but the book probably did not have a direct influence on claymation films. Still, the plasticine product would become the favourite product for clay animators, as it did not dry and harden (unlike normal clay) and was much more malleable than its harder and greasier Italian predecessor plasteline.[6]
J. Stuart Blackton's Chew Chew Land; or, The Adventures of Dolly and Jim (1910) features primitive claymation in chewing-gum inspired dream scenes.[11]
Walter R. Booth's Animated Putty (1911) featured clay molding itself into different shapes.[12]
Willie Hopkins produced over fifty clay-animated segments entitled Miracles in Mud[13] for the weekly Universal Screen Magazine from 1916 to 1918.[citation needed] He also made artistic modeled titles for the movie Everywoman (1919).[14]
New York artist Helena Smith Dayton, possibly the first female animator, had much success with her "Caricatypes" clay statuettes before she began experimenting with claymation. Some of her first resulting short films were screened on 25 March 1917. She released an adaptation of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet circa half a year later. Although the films and her technique received much attention from the press, it seems she did not continue making films after she returned to New York from managing a YMCA in Paris around 1918. None of her films have yet surfaced, but the extant magazine articles have provided several stills and circa 20 poorly printed frames from two film strips.[15]
By the 1920s, drawn animation using either cels or the slash system was firmly established in the U.S. as the dominant mode of animation production. Increasingly, three-dimensional forms such as clay were driven into relative obscurity as the cel method became the preferred method for the studio cartoon.[16] Cel animation can be more easily divided into small tasks performed by many workers, like an assembly line.[17]
In 1921, claymation appeared in a short sequence in the
The oldest known extant claymation film (with claymation as its main production method) is Long Live the Bull (1926)[18] by Joseph Sunn.[19]
Art Clokey's short student film Gumbasia (1955) featured all kinds of clay objects changing shape and moving to a jazz tune.[20] He also created the iconic character Gumby that would feature in segments in Howdy Doody in 1955 and 1956, and afterwards got his own television series (1957-1969, 1987-1989) and a theatrical film (1995). Clokey also produced Davey and Goliath (1960–2004) for the United Lutheran Church in America.
Claymation has been popularized on television in children's shows such as
In 1972, at Marc Chinoy's Cineplast Films Studio in Munich, Germany, André Roche created a set of clay-animated German-language-instruction films (for non-German-speaking children) called Kli-Kla-Klawitter for the Second German TV-Channel; and another one for a traffic education series, Herr Daniel paßt auf ("Mr. Daniel Pays Attention").
Claymation has been used in Academy Award-winning short films such as Closed Mondays (Will Vinton and Bob Gardiner, 1974)[21] and The Sand Castle (1977).
Pioneering the
Nick Park joined Aardman in 1985. Early in his career, he and Aardman helped make the award-winning animated video for Peter Gabriel's song "Sledgehammer" in 1986. Park would become the most successful claymation director, receiving a total of six Academy Award nominations and winning four with Creature Comforts (1989) (the first Wallace and Gromit film A Grand Day Out was also nominated), The Wrong Trousers (1993), A Close Shave (1995) and Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005).[23] Wallace and Gromit spin-off Shaun the Sheep has also proved hugely successful with long-running television series (since 2007), theatrical movies and its own spin-off Timmy Time (since 2009).
Aardman's Chicken Run (2000) became the highest-grossing stop motion animated film in history.[24]
Aardman's Flushed Away is a CGI replication of claymation.[25]
Alexander Tatarsky managed to get work at Multtelefilm division of Studio Ekran with the help of Eduard Uspensky who wrote the screenplay for Tatarsky's first director's effort — Plasticine Crow (1981), which also happened to be Soviet first claymation film. After the enormous success Tatarsky was offered to create new opening and closing sequences for the popular children's TV show Good Night, Little Ones! also made of plasticine; they were later included into the Guinness Book of Records by the number of broadcasts. It was followed by two other claymation shorts: New Year's Eve Song by Ded Moroz (1982) and Last Year's Snow Was Falling (1983).
Garri Bardin directed several claymation comedy films, including Break!, a parody on a boxing match for which Bardin received a Golden Dove award at the 1986 Dok Leipzig.
Television commercials have utilized claymation, spawning for instance The California Raisins (1986-1998, Vinton Studios) and the Chevron Cars ads (Aardman).
The PJs (1999–2001) was a sitcom featuring the voice of Eddie Murphy, produced by Murphy in collaboration with Ron Howard, the Will Vinton Studios and others.
Many independent young filmmakers have published claymations online, on such sites as Newgrounds.
More adult-oriented claymation shows have been broadcast on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim lineup, including Robot Chicken (which uses claymation and action figures as stop-motion puppets in conjunction) and Moral Orel. Nickelodeon's Nick at Nite later developed their own adult show, Glenn Martin, DDS (2009-2011).
Several
Notable clay animators
- Garri Bardin
- Art Clokey
- Joan C. Gratz
- Lee Hardcastle
- Peter Lord
- Virginia May[26]
- Eli Noyes
- Nick Park
- Aleksandr Tatarskiy
- Will Vinton
See also
- Cel animation
- List of films featuring claymation
- Stop-motion animation
Citations
- ^ "Clay animation". www.sparetimelabs.com. Archived from the original on 2015-09-24. Retrieved 2015-04-05.
- ^ Matlin, Julie (August 13, 2018). "Animation Techniques: Stop-Motion". Archived from the original on October 14, 2018. Retrieved October 13, 2018.
- ^ "Gumbo (2003)". Archived from the original on 2009-01-24. Retrieved 2008-08-13.
- ^ "Oddball Films: Stop-Motion Explosion III - Thur. Aug 15 - 8PM". Archived from the original on 2019-05-13. Retrieved 2018-10-13.
- ^ "Clay Animation – Clay Animation History". Wordpress. Archived from the original on 27 November 2015. Retrieved 26 February 2013.
- ^ JSTOR 27670717.
- ^ Modern Sculptors (1908) - IMDb, archived from the original on 2020-11-22, retrieved 2020-02-20
- ^ "El escultor moderno - Vídeo Dailymotion". Dailymotion. 22 April 2008. Archived from the original on 2020-06-04. Retrieved 2020-02-20.
- ^ A Sculptor's Welsh Rabbit Dream (1908) - IMDb, archived from the original on 2020-11-28, retrieved 2020-02-20
- ^ The Sculptor's Nightmare (1908) - IMDb, archived from the original on 2020-11-20, retrieved 2020-02-20
- ^ Chew Chew Land; or, The Adventures of Dolly and Jim (1910) - IMDb, archived from the original on 2020-11-24, retrieved 2020-02-20
- ^ Animated Putty (1911). BFI National Archive. Archived from the original on 2021-03-10. Retrieved 2020-02-20 – via YouTube.
- ISBN 978-0-8230-9980-1. Archivedfrom the original on 2022-07-28. Retrieved 2020-11-26.
- ^ "Los Angeles Herald 26 January 1920 — California Digital Newspaper Collection". cdnc.ucr.edu. Archived from the original on 2020-07-28. Retrieved 2020-02-20.
- ^ "Jason Douglass – Artist, Author, and Pioneering Motion Picture Animator: The Career of Helena Smith Dayton (runner-up) – Animation Studies". Archived from the original on 2021-03-08. Retrieved 2020-01-25.
- ^ a b Frierson, Michael (1993). Clay comes out of the inkwell (in Animation Journal - Fall 1993).
- ^ "A History of Clay Animation". ABC News. Archived from the original on 2020-11-09. Retrieved 2021-02-14.
- ^ Sunn, Joseph, Long Live the Bull (Animation, Short), Plastic Art Productions, archived from the original on 2021-10-28, retrieved 2021-11-01
- ^ "The Oldest Surviving Claymation Film - From 1926!". Yestervid. 2015-04-30. Archived from the original on 2020-01-25. Retrieved 2020-01-25.
- ^ Gumbasia (1955) - IMDb, archived from the original on 2020-11-25, retrieved 2020-01-25
- ^ "Oddball Films: Will Vinton's Claymation Marvels - Thur. June 12 - 8PM". Archived from the original on 2018-09-10. Retrieved 2018-10-13.
- ^ Sarson, Katrina (April 27, 2017). "Animator Joan Gratz Embraces Technology To Create Her Newest Films". Oregon Public Broadcasting. Archived from the original on December 4, 2017. Retrieved January 30, 2018.
- ^ "Aaardman – Company History". Archived from the original on 24 August 2020. Retrieved 12 Oct 2011.
- ^ "The Longer View: British animation". BBC. Archived from the original on 28 September 2015. Retrieved 9 October 2015.
- ^ "First look at Aardman's rat movie". BBC News Online. BBC. 16 February 2006. Archived from the original on 28 July 2022. Retrieved 13 October 2018.
- ^ "STOP-MOTION MARVELS: 'George Washington Modeled in Clay' (1927) and 'Red Riding Hood' (1926) |". cartoonresearch.com. Archived from the original on 2021-02-24. Retrieved 2021-02-14.
General and cited references
- Taylor, Richard. The Encyclopedia of Animation Techniques. Running Press, Philadelphia, 1996. ISBN 1-56138-531-X
- ISBN 0-8109-1996-6
- Frierson,Michael. "Clay Animation: American Highlights 1908 to the Present". Twayne Publishers: New York, 1994. ISBN 0805793275
External links
- Media related to Clay animation at Wikimedia Commons