For
most of the tour, we saw where they shot most of their animations and many of
their prop sets they held from previous works. One of the set pieces that
caught my eye was the mask of the giant rooster mask they used for the
Fantastic Noodle advertisements as well as the massive prop sets used for the
old Mortein Flyspray ads.
I had always wondered how animators in the industry
constructed and rigged their puppets for stop motion animation and looking back
at how AniFex executes it, it’s interesting to see and take in. Most of their
puppets consist of a metallic skeleton made up of several pivot points and
wires which allows the animators to freely move the puppets. On top of that,
the skeleton itself can be modified when needed to fine tune how the puppet
moves, and walks.
Asides from how the skeletons are made and what they consist
of, the puppets themselves are constructed through a very fine system, which
begins with the puppet themselves being moulded on clay before being sent to
where they would make a casting for the puppet. Afterwards, the cast of the
puppet is then used to create moulds with, which are made out of a composite of
rubber, silicon and various other materials.
Overall, the tour gave me a better sense of how stop motion animators produce their works as well as showing how the industry operates in terms of client contracts and what risks are needed in order to deliver on the client's demands.
