Post 5: Model Making Techniques

The Model making process in 'Frankenweenie' started with Ian MacKinnon taking Tim Burtons sketches and with a small team of sculptures and create basic models of the characters from Plasticine, to see how the charterers would look as a group rather than focusing to much on detailing.


Armature- The 'Frankenweenie' team used armature to create their models, they made a Plasticine character stand in a neutral pose to make molds of the body, head, hands and feet. They then designed an armature that would fit inside made of steel and could achieve almost any position desired by the director. (Bleedingcoolcom. 2012). The armatures can also be covered in 3D printed material instead of clay.


Sculpting- Using Plasticine clay, models can be positioned in to any movement they are also sometimes sculpted over a armature frame for better stability, as just moving a clay model can be easily damaged an example of this is 'The Pirates!: an Adventure With Scientists'

(Reelrundowncom. 2019) An example of a model that was completely made from clay is the Aardman character 'Morph' he is molded from scratch after his 20 year retirement "Morph is still spineless, with no armature to support his delicate frame." (Independentcouk. 2014) Lord the original creator uses original scales to measure the correct weight and use the correct amount of clay to sculpt him from one ball. details like his mouth are carved in with a wooden stick. 


Cutouts- One of the oldest and most straight forward ways to animate a character, pieces of material or paper are cut and drawn to look like objects or people then are altered or added to to look like they are moving after taking a picture of the previous image.

(Chroncom. 2019).  An example of cutout animation is the original 'Southpark' episodes, the characters were made out of sugar paper, the two creators were commissioned to make six full-length episodes however, upon deciding that this task would be to labor intensive they created only the first episode using sugar paper characters, the remainder of the season was made on the editing software Maya this technology meant that effects could be applied to the images to make them look as though they were still paper cutouts. (Parker, T. 2019)         




The advantages of using Armature over sculpting it that an armature model is less susceptible to damage as they are often made of either: steel, aluminium or other similar metals rather than a clay model that can easily be broken when trying to alter the pose of the character or if the figure is dropped. Another point is that it is simple to make precise movements with an armature frame. The difference when using cutouts is that although cutouts mean a single animator can draw as many or as least detail as they please, movement toward or away from the camera is difficult to achieve and facial close-ups don't work well this is also true for lip syncing in general. (Parker, T. 2019)