For movies where the models needed to appear to interact with real actors, Harryhausen would shoot live-action backgrounds, animate the models in front of the rear-projected background while matted for the foreground, and with the perspective controlled, the models appear to be living, breathing, and having their being (and usually rampaging) in a real-world environment. When the film is screened at 24 frames per second, the model has the illusion of motion, much like the flipbooks we drew as children. With simple stop motion, one places the model on a scaled set, shoots a single frame, makes a tiny adjustment to the model, shoots another frame, repeat ad infinitum. Costumes to dress the models were sewn by Harryhausen’s mother. His models consisted of a metal armature (usually made by his father, an engineer) covered in latex rubber and hand-painted by Harryhausen. It is also nostalgic in that it hearkens back to a time when it was the only way to create certain effects. In a world where almost every product is mass-produced in the fastest way to appeal to the widest possible audience, stop motion is handmade, slowly and carefully. Perhaps, as the article above theorizes, stop motion’s appeal lies in the desire for a return of the artisanal, a feeling of craftsmanship, a counter-reaction to the modern mass-production that results in so much facile, formulaic rubbish. A rare, 3-D depth in a field dominated by 2-D computer images that employ all kinds of technical wizardry to give the illusion that they aren’t what they are: artificial and intangible. There is something tangible about it that modern computer generated imagery, no matter how technically impressive, lacks. Massive moneymakers such as the LEGO movie franchise have even gone to great lengths to use digital methods in attempts to emulate the look of stop motion. I would posit that stop motion affects viewers in a way that soulless, homogenous CGI extravaganzas do not and perhaps never will. I think creativity and charm go a long way (eg, my hands-down favorite, Aardman features such as Wallace & Gromit). I could also write an entire piece on the uncanny valley of CGI’s “lifelike qualities.” Yet the interesting thing is that this article and others of similar ilk are forced into statements against interest, admitting that stop motion thrives as they try to figure out exactly why it’s still around. It’s a crude, time-consuming, labour-intensive form of animation that has been trumped by the jaw-dropping, smooth, and lifelike qualities of CGI.”1 I take exception to the word “crude” just because something is simple doesn’t mean it’s crude, and CGI is so commonplace that jaw-dropping has long ceased to describe it. A 2019 article opined, “Let’s face it, stop motion should be dead. Given that the method has been around for over a century and digital animation has exploded into a billion-dollar industry since the 1990s, one might think that stop motion is a relic of the past. Stop-motion animation is a simple technique that requires few resources – with the exception of obsessive attention to detail and a boatload of patience. O’Brien acted as mentor to Harryhausen when they worked together on Mighty Joe Young (1949), another ape picture which won an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. He wasn’t the first to pioneer this art form he was a successor to Willis O’Brien, the animator behind 1925’s The Lost World and the iconic 1933 King Kong. For those unfamiliar, Harryhausen was best known as a visual effects artist, a master of stop-motion animation. Harryhausen passed away in 2013, but the legacy he left, including the modern filmmakers he inspired and influenced, continues. I share with Ray Harryhausen a fascination with creatures, especially dinosaurs, and a birthday – 29 June 2020 would have been his 100 th (no, we don’t share a birth year).
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