MAKING YOUR STOP MOTION SET - THE BASICS
Now that you have installed your animation software and want to know how to make a lego movie, you will have to think about how to create your set. Its simple to do but you should take care to understand some basic steps like securing your set , camera and using desk lamps to light you character for the best images possible.
A base plate is a must when creating a ©LEGO movie. You will really upset your viewers if your whole set moves during a movie. So tape down the four corners of a base plate ( or use sticky blu-tak ) to secure it to a desk or table. Be careful also not to bump your table during the animation process. Everything needs to be secure.
Also secure your webcam so that is does not move when moving your characters on your set. You can rely on onionskinning to some extent if you bump your characters but it will not be much use to you if you move your webcam unnecessarily.
MAKE YOUR LEGO® MINIFIG WALK WITH STOP MOTION
An easy step by step video guide on how to make stop motion with your lego minifig character. This video shows you the first method you can use to make a realistic walk cycle using 5 simple positions for your character using our lego animation maker software. We overlay the still snapshots that were taken for each step on the video so you can see how each position compares to the previous and following positions. Make sure you watch all the video tutorials preceeding this tutorial if you are unsure as to how to set up your scene and lighting. Its a good idea when using a new minifig also to loosen its arms ,head and legs. To loosen the head for example you can sand down his neck. Just pull off the head and use a nail buffer to take the surface off the neck section. New LEGO minifigs tend to be stiff. So loosen them out before you start your LEGO movie.
MAKE YOUR MINIFIG OR CLAY GUY TALK WITH STOP MOTION
iKITMovie makes it easy to create mouths and the impression of talking by using built in images that you can overlay on your characters without ever having to leave iKIT’s interface. This tells you how to make stop motion come alive with mouth animations. The mouth overlays for your lego movie animation are broken up in to sylables. For example the “L” sound plays a large portion of the work “Hello”. In fact in this video we show you how to make the overlay for “Hello” which is made up of “L” and “O” predominantly.
All the needed mouths are available to make it easy. There are also ones in the included library for “happy” or “scared” faces.
ADDING STILL IMAGES TO YOUR STOP MOTION BACKGROUND
Why not replace your green / blue screen backdrop with a still image. This video tutorial on how to make a lego movie shows you the “animation maker” how to select a still image background step by step to make it easy. You can use an image from our library or import your own jpegs images to make a cool LEGO Movie animation. The most important thing to remember when using blue/greenscreen backdrops is lighting. You must avoid shadows under all circumstances. Also use a filter ( greaseproof / white paper ) over your lamps. This breaks the light up ( dispersing it evenly ) in order to avoid “hard” light. That is to say light that will more likely cast shadows.
There are times of course that you will want shadows in your stop motion but that is another tutorial which we will get to later in this article.
ADDING CHROMA AND OVERLAY TO A STOP MOTION PROJECT
Why not have chromakey and overlay in the same project. In order to achieve this effect you will need to involve two projects. You can add an overlay to a project but you must first add chromakey to the images in a separate project. Then import those chromakeyed images in to another project and add overlay to them. This method allows unlimited possibilities to add many layers of overlay to your LEGO movie.
Don’t forget to check out our Top 10 Tips to making a lego movie also