So animation isn’t my strong suit. And no, I don’t just mean drawing. Even something as simplistic as stop-motion animation is a struggle for me.
Okay, I take it back, I shouldn’t say stop-motion animation is simplistic.
For the assignment, we were told we could basically do whatever we wanted. You would think that freedom would make the project more enjoyable since it allowed a strong level of creativity, which is something I usually thrive on. However, with a million directions to go in, it’s hard to narrow your thought process down. I had a lot of grandiose schemes and ideas that could have been implemented, but with a heavy schedule, many of my ideas were too big and too great to go through with. And then, of course, the weekend where I’m to create and film this entire project – BAM! – I’m hit with the flu. Typical for me.
Still, flu or no flu I had to persevere in two things. I had to purchase a birthday gift for my younger brother (he turned three this past week) and I had to complete this project. My aching body went with the simpler task first and so I was off to Target. While browsing in an aisle full of Children’s action figures and fake ovens with fake food, of characters who I no longer recognize (who is Phineas? and who is his pal Ferb? And why are there barbies of this girl named Victoria Justice? Where were the toys of MY childhood?) I stumbled upon an old familiar face in a sea of strangers: Mr. Potato Head. At that moment, a little lightbulb went off above my head. Minutes later, Mr. Potato Head and I left Target hand in hand (along with some strange car-world crash-dummy contraption for the three year old…. in hindsight, I probably should have checked it for choking hazards first.)
For the visual part of this project, I used a very simplistic set that I set up in our master bathroom with two spotlight lamps and a janky tripod made of books and other weird stabilizers to get the camera low enough to film this project. I took the photos on a D90 with my own fixed 50 mm 1.8 lens. I used a grey sheet for the backdrop and tried to keep the frame rate at 15 (really, 30) frames per second. It took a LOT of patience and I had to retake a lot of the pictures when I could finally get my head close enough to the ground (where the camera was) to realize several of the pictures were out of focus, even when using the M-A focus setting on the camera. It took me about four hours to take all of the photos. I know it doesn’t seem like it in the piece… but this crap is a lot of hard work.
For the sound design, I found a GREAT song on 615 that I used as the background music, then used my own voice as the voiceover, which in hindsight I sometimes think sounds a bit jarring. I used a lot of recorded natural sounds that I recorded in the bathroom. It took me a bit to get he sounds to mesh together well but I think I was pleased with the finished product.
Overall this project was a lot more work than I thought it was going to be but I’m proud of my end piece. I’d love to hear any feedback you guys have to improve on my next project!
Celeste Smith 
I really liked the concept of you being a artist and Mr. Potato Head as your model. At first I assumed that he was supposed to be a photo model but the pencil sketching sound cleared that up. It was very interesting to have you giving commentary throughout the video. It allowed for us to watch Mr. Potato Head change positions while your commentary provided the basis for the storyline. For the stop animation to appear legitimate I would refrain from putting your hands in the shot. Your animation is smooth but it takes away from whole effect.