Using the Body - Stop Motion: Passion, Process and Performance - page 244

right poses, but something was wrong. It just didn't l ow into
one complete dance. You could see her counting four kicks
there, two kicks there, step turn, but there was no feeling that
these steps were linked to the previous ones, adding up to a
whole. She was ticking of each pose and shape, but it was not
dancing. It was moving from pose to pose. This bit was slow, this
bit quick, rather than growing and evolving from a slow section
to a quick one organically. Stop motion can be much the same,
where we put so much ef ort into concentrating on a particular
frame that we can overlook the previous and incoming frames,
not looking at the bigger picture. I try to have something like
a heart line in my head, seeing not only the troughs and peaks
but where they come in the whole phrase of the movement. We
cannot hope that a series of individual frames placed together
will produce a beautiful movement. There has to be a shape and
structure. A musical tune is not about the individual notes, but the
placing of notes next to each other and how they l ow from one
to another. It's the same for words in a sentence. It is important
to see animation as a phrase, not just individual letters or frames.
Stop motion is half way between dance, which makes obvious
statements about its artii cial movement by drawing attention
to repeated patterns and shapes, and live action, which is full of
quirky, unpredictable clutter. Stop frame must have the clarity of
dance but the spontaneity of live action.

Dancers are always
aware of the shape they
make for the audience
(Susan Guy).

Rhythm

This is a much overlooked aspect of movement, as more
technically minded animators can i nd it hard to move away from
dividing a move into exact calibrations. Such precision produces dead animation and does not
help the illusion of anything having life or energy.

A great example of rhythm is in Suzie Templeton's Dog . The young boy is brushing his hair, and
although the prop comb may not physically go through his hair, Suzie has the boy do several
repeated strokes of the comb. As he pulls the comb the moves are slow and small, with a few
sudden quick moves at the end as the comb leaves the hair and starts again. She also moves
the boy's head as if it is being pulled along by the comb getting stuck in the hair. This is pure
mime, but the dif erence of pacing and repeats capture the essence of brushing hair. A bad
version of the same scene would have been to have had equally paced strokes back and forth,
with no movement in the head. There wouldn't have been any suggested contact or ef ort.

Small moves

Small moves are enormously satisfying if done well. Again in Dog , Suzie Templeton
manages to make the most subtle of movements. This all depends on the schedule
and the sophistication of the puppet. There is a danger in small moves that the
natural memory in silicone, for example, will not help. You are pretty lucky to have
a puppet that will precisely stay where you put it i rst time. Gravity, tensioning