Final Project - Adventures in Animation

Zoetrope

A zoetrope is a tool used to create some of the first animations in history. Invented in 1834 by William George Horner, the zoetrope uses a cylinder with slots cut into the side in order to animate a strip of images on the inside of the cylinder. Milton Bradley Company eventually gained the patent for the zoetrope around 1867. With this patent, the zoetrope was brought into homes across the country as a child’s toy.

How I built my Zoetrope

When I set out to build my zoetrope, I wanted to see if I could design and build it without using any instructions online. First, I used cardboard and made a disc with a 12-inch diameter in order to have about 37 inches in circumference. Through trial and error, I eventually used a string and some tacks to make my disk. Once I had the base, I cut out some cardboard to make the walls, and complete my cylinder. Finally, to make it spin I used a small wheel, a bolt, a washer and some nuts. Once I had the cylinder, I measured out in even increments so I knew where to cut my slits.

The pictures

The next challenge I faced was photographing a set of pictures that could be animated. Logically, I needed an action that had the same beginning and end, and couldn’t change the background of the images to maintain the illusion of movement. I tried out images ranging from push-ups, to high-fives, to jumping jacks, and finally settled on my friend smoking a corncob pipe and my friend drinking from a soda can. I like these images strips because they also play with the idea of what society considers "smoking" (cigarettes, marijuana) and "drinking" (alcohol). I then printed the images in the proper size for the zoetrope I built (about 7 inches by 4.5 inches).

The results

Through some testing, I found that the best way to “animate” my series of images was through good lighting, slow movement, and widening my slits slightly. Even then, I still don’t have great animation. Other things that I think might help with my animations would be changing the size of my zoetrope so that I can use more pictures that are smaller overall.

Variations

Looking online, I found some really cool 3d animations that Pixar and Studio Ghibli have done using clay characters. An interesting technique to note was the use of a strobe light instead of slits to produce the animated quality, something I would be interested in testing in the future.

Along with my zoetrope, I also decided to try my hand at another form of animation. Using the set of images that I had already taken for the zoetrope, I created two small flipbooks that I believe had better results. To improve upon these, I would like to use different paper and more pictures to smooth out the animations.

References

For this project, I wanted to see if I could build the zoetrope with no help beyond what I saw at the George Eastman House Museum. After I built my version though, I looked at other ideas online:

· https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfAzr0GWknU

· http://www.instructables.com/id/Make-a-zoetrope-or-20/

· https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5khDGKGv088

· https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyGoVrsBSz0