stopmotion with mac?

[kariP]

Hello,

I've been using tvp for 2 months and I have to say, I don't think I've never learned as quickly a program than now. In the beginning the interface made my eyes cross, but now it seems right and everything just seems to be in place. Ah, and I believe buying tvp has been the best investment of my educational life. It speeded up my animationprocess times 10. Really.. Now when im able to make movement quickly by sketching them, im really able to get inside the movement and stay there. Now I also know that I'm able to do something from beginning to finish. It's very liberating for creativity.

Anyhow,

My question:

We are going to do puppet animation in our school and im wondering how to make tvp stop motion work with mac. In the tvp manual it says canon plugin works with pc only. Does anybody have any experience with stop motion in tvp and mac? I have a basic canon powershot a85, can it be connected? Or do i need a real "system camera"?
I tried to find answers from the forum, but found little. (mac alone as a searchword don't give any results, )

Thanks for any reply.
-Kari

ps. I've been browsing this forum from when i started planning to buy tvp, and i'm starting to be sure it has some good stuff in it. For example, My dog Tulip. I first heard it from here and now theyre showing it in Animatricks in Helsinki. Have to be there. Also Kari Hietalahti, a funny Finnish man, said he's very interested of the movie because he also has a very extraordinary dog.

[slowtiger]

There's a free software still available, it's called "FrameThief" and works with every digital video camera - in video resolution. It is very good for fast capturing of frames and creating Quicktime files from that.

The stopmotion artists I know all use normal still cameras with memory cards which they bulk transmit to their Mac.

You may find more detailed information at http://www.stopmotionanimation.com/.

[Fabrice]

Things will improve soon regarding the stop motion since we are now supporting the BlackMagic Cards intensity (~ 200 $) (http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/intensity/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ), so we can grab the pictures from any camera which has a HDMI output on Mac or PC.
Also HD-DV firewire camera should work better than before

Please wait for the new update to get those new options available.

[kariP]

hmm.. i thought tvp would be able to grab photos.
Makes me wonder, why then they have built option for stop motion? Is anybody using it for anything? In pc or in mac? Or is it just to be used for webcam stop motion?

seems that there's not many free options for mac.. Framethief seem to get recommendations, I'll have to give it a test.

webpage is wonderful, they seem to have the stuff I probably need.. Thanks!

Slowtiger, how do the stop motionists check their material during shooting? They must have some preview option? They can't just shoot and go home to check what they've done? If I understood the "bulk" meaning correctly..

[Byron]

how do the stop motionists check their material during shooting? - They can't just shoot and go home to check what they've done?

Hehe - well in the days before computer framegrabbers, that's exactly what they did - using surface gauges to position their puppets.

I'm afraid I can't help with Mac software - but as Slowtiger says, make a post at http://www.stopmotionanimation.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; and you will certainly get all the help you need, I know there are people there using Macs for stopmotion.

[kariP]

Fabrice: This is probably good news and looks very high tech. For me this would just be a bit too much. I would have to use this shuttle, and it's just.. too much. Im not very hardwareoriented person so I'm not able to see how to use this device.

Byron: Yes, I've heard rumours that the old school have animated this way. To me it feels scary. But to the pioneers the first glimpse of their film probably felt like christmas.
Im going in the stopmotion forum and see what is possible.

Thank you!

[slowtiger]

In my Super8 days I did some stopmotion as well. Timing is surprisingly easy - with just a bit of practice you'll be able to "feel" it. This seems to work for most people, even total novices to animation, as I found when I gave workshops to 12 yr olds. They did a 2 minute cutout animation over the course of a weekend, and albeit the timing was crude, they already had used the concept of different pacings and dynamic.

[ZigOtto]

... I have a basic canon powershot a85, can it be connected? ...

connected : yes I guess, ... recognised and remote-controlable : I don't know ...
the canon powershot A85 used to work fine with the canon plugin (pc only at this time),
so, maybe you can try to install tvpa on a windows partition via bootcamp or whatever Mac pc-emulation system.

[kariP]

I've done one stop motion before and while animating, I didn't look the motion from the software or from any previews. We used monkeyjam for capturing and for compositing the shot. And to check if everything went good. I focused on the character and somehow kept in mind where he was coming and where he was going. Just good concentrating i guess. This is probably the way the old school did it. I didn't remember this way of doing animation because ive been using tvp, which gives me a possibility to a different method.

Bootcamp is a possibility. I've checked on that.. But it feels too much compared to just having a pc. Ill rather use the framethief for capturing. But thanks for letting me know.

Theres still time.. I'll wait and see if anything happens. Maybe a canon plugin for mac, or Fabrices magical card..

Sorry for my english and my word orders. And thank you all.

[Fabrice]

According to Davd Nethery,
This HD webcam is also working on Mac with TVP Animation :
http://agent.liquiddigital.com.au/index.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; (cheap 99 $ )

[Hervé]

Any webcam should work

http://www.tvpaint.com/v2/content/artic ... .php?id=35" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ( Video tuto for TVP9 - Not 9.5 )

[kariP]

So webcam is working because it has no shutter? With a webcam tvp records the preview picture. But with a normal camera you have to control it through the program. And thats where it gets difficult?

I'll try out some tests with my macbooks inbuilt webcam and see what can i do with that.
But i believe a webcam wont be enough for our schoolwork, f.e if we have to use depth of field. Thanks for your input though.

[D.T. Nethery]

So webcam is working because it has no shutter? With a webcam tvp records the preview picture. But with a normal camera you have to control it through the program. And thats where it gets difficult?

I'll try out some tests with my macbooks inbuilt webcam and see what can i do with that.
But i believe a webcam wont be enough for our schoolwork, f.e if we have to use depth of field. Thanks for your input though.

Any mini-dv camera with firewire interface should work with TVP . If the mini-dv camera has manual focusing and manual exposure then you can get depth-of-field.

Problem is the mini-dv cameras that have firewire dv-out are disappearing from the market , as are computers with firewire ports built in. The good thing is there are thoursands of good , used mini dv cameras from Canon, Sony, JVC, etc. which can be picked up relatively inexpensively on eBay or other used-camera sources.

As Fabrice mentioned , all consumer video is going to HDMI , so an HDMI port or add-on HDMI capture card is the way of the future (until the manufacturers change video formats and interface again in two- to - five years. )

The AGent V5 Webcam that Fabrice mentioned has manual focus ring on the front of the camera , so you can get some depth of field by focusing on a close object and throwing the background out-of-focus ... but it's a webcam , so don't expect very sophisticated controls or optics. But as webcams go it's a good one. It works well for simple frame-grabbing in TVP for stop-motion.

[Byron]

Yep - I use a MiniDV camera with firewire for stop motion, and I've tried it with TVP and it works perfectly, although TVP is not (and is not intended to be) a fully fledged stopmotion application (I use AnimatorHD). The camera is a Sony TRV19E, which cost less than £50 on eBay. It has full manual control, so is good for stopmotion.

[Fabrice]

So webcam is working because it has no shutter? With a webcam tvp records the preview picture. But with a normal camera you have to control it through the program. And thats where it gets difficult?

yes, you are right. Canon and Nikon are not helping, since they don't send any up-to-date development kit, or simply doesn't provide any informations about Mac support for the EOS serie.

Fortunalety, BlackMagic is more helpful