Animating with Stop Motion Pro

Chapter 2

Animate People

Since the birth of cinema, a number of notable pioneers have used stop motion to generate visual effects that create fantastic worlds. An early example is the work of French magician George Méliès. His pivotal work, A Trip to the Moon, made in 1902, explored a whole host of tricks that became the foundation for visual effects as we know them today. One trick related to animation is thought to have been discovered by accident. As the story goes, Méliès was photographing a horse-drawn carriage parked in front of a shop when the “hand-cranked” film camera froze up and jammed. As a result, the filming abruptly stopped and the operator paused to unsnarl and fix the jam that apparently involved something outside of the film ...