Stop motion

What is Stop Motion?

Stop motion is an animation technique that physically manipulates an object so it appears to move on its own. An object is moved in small increments, then individually photographed, creating the illusion of movement when played. Dolls, LEGO® and clay figures (claymation) are often used since they are easy to re-position. Stop motion films can also involve humans, household appliances etc. for comedic effect. Wishart (2017) states that “student teachers view the opportunities that making an animation creates for peer discussion as the most likely to promote learning… It is the holistic process of representing and re-representing one's scientific knowledge in different modes that made animation creation appear to be so useful in bringing about and supporting learning.” 

Stop Motion Tools

We recommend you try Stop Motion Studio (for iOS or Android). This is a dedicated stop motion app for smartphones and tablets. It includes many features such as frame-by-frame preview at different speeds, fade in/out, select, copy, paste, reverse and delete frames, green screen, themes etc.

Frames Per Second (fps)

One of the main question you need to think about when making stop motion movie is how many frames per second (fps) you will use. The more frames per second, the smoother the action is, but the longer it will take to make the movie. Typical options are:

2 fps - recommended by Slowmation

10 or 15 fps - bouncy type of animation used on Instagram/ Facebook

24 fps - cinematic