Thursday, April 19, 2012

gather: a stop-motion video & how-to

A short stop-motion video about ephemeral art. I went to Utah Lake, walked around the shore for 45 minutes listening to an Iron and Wine playlist. Every time the word "the" was sung I would pick something up. This composition documents what I gathered during the process of performance that day.
[Song: Generator (Second Floor) by Freelance Whales].


and now for the how-to, if you ever want to make a stop-motion video yourself:
{for mac users only}

1. decide upon a simple idea first
2. take stills of an object that you slowly move/add unto/take away from. {best if the camera is in the same position, so use a tripod!} take a picture for each frame, start to finish. for example, if you wanted to capture a toy moving from one place to another, take a picture of it, move it a small amount, take another picture, move it, take a picture, and so on until you are done.
3. upload photos to iphoto {edit accordingly}.
4. quit iphoto and open imovie. create a new project. 
5. on the right hand side of the timeline there will be an icon of a camera, click on it. select the pictures you want to use, they should already be in the order you uploaded them in. drag and drop them into the box of your new project. {on my screen it is the upper half section of imovie, above the timeline}. 
6. now that all your stills are there you can adjust the speed you want the photos to appear. hover your mouse over the first still and you will be able to change the settings of the clip. change the number of seconds. you also have the option to apply that time frame to all slides. 
7. to add music, select the music icon on the right side of the timeline and you can pick a song from your itunes. drag and drop that into the space as well. 

and voilá! if you want to edit it more complexly just look up tutorials online, there are lots of them! 
if you have any questions, you can ask me but i won't guarantee i know the answer. 
enjoy!