Awesome Lego Stop Motion Tutorials, Resources & Tools

You’ve seen those amazing Lego Stop Motion movies all over the internet. Everyone loves them. So, if you ever wanted to be the writer, director and producer of your own movie (with minifigs), this is the article for you.

Lego Stop Motion Sites

Brickfilms
Description : This site and its community is dedicated to brickfilming – making stop motion animation with LEGO or other brick like elements. The directory contains a large collection of films, you can submit your latest work, discuss this and every other issue that might come to your mind in the forums and also checkout the Resources and Tutorials to help you with any brickfilming related questions.

Spite Your Face Productions
Description : Spite Your Face is a London animation company, it is responsible for a number of celebrated short films, they specialize in animation and video content for broadcast, web, corporate and DVD. And they love Lego.

Brickfilmsfestivalen
Description : A Swedish Blog dedicated to the art of Lego Stop Motion. It offers great resources as well as a showcase of movies.

Bricks in Motion
Description : Bricks in Motion is a new and up and coming site devoted to the creation of stop motion animation movies using LEGO bricks and other toy block mediums. The only problem is they are lacking content, could everyone please start submitting stuff. This site could be cool.

Best Bricks
Description : Best Bricks is a community of stop motion animators who animate using plastic bricks. Members can submit their films to the directory for other users to view and enjoy. Best Bricks is made and updated by volunteers who donate their time and money in the site. It is also the Best Bricks policy to always provide access to all content on the site for free.

Lego Stop Motion Freeware

LDraw – Lego CAD Drawing
Description : LDraw is an open standard for LEGO CAD programs that allow the user to create virtual LEGO models and scenes. You can use it to document models you have physically built, create building instructions just like LEGO, render 3D photo realistic images of your virtual models and even make animations.
Compatibility : MAC only.

MonkeyJam
Description : MonkeyJam is a digital penciltest program. It is designed to let you capture images from a webcam, camcorder, or scanner and assemble them as separate frames of an animation. You can also import images and sound files already on your computer. Although it is designed for pencil and paper, MonkeyJam can also be used for StopMotion animation and has several features just for that. Movies created in MonkeyJam can be exported as AVI files.
Compatibility : Windows XP and Vista.

Stop Motion Animator
Description : Stop Motion Animator is an easy to use program, it works with video captures, your webcam images, analog and digital cameras. Freeware.
Compatibility : Windows XP and Vista.

Lego Stop Motion Shareware

Stop Motion Pro
Description : Stop Motion Pro is a software tool for making stop motion and other animated films. It requires a video camera, webcam or digital still camera.
Compatibility : Windows XP and Vista.

iStopMotion 2
Description : Create amazing stop-motion animations and time-lapse movies using your digital video camera, web camera or digital still camera. You can create characters and sets from Lego, it is a great way to tell a story.
iStopMotion 2 has a comprehensive suite of tools and features, and well worth the $49 you would be paying, you can also download the trial version.
Compatibility : MAC only.

AnimatorHD
Description : AnimatorHD – is a PC based software, frame grabber, for creating stop-motion and time-lapse animation. Just like iStopMotion 2, this is powerful software with a fairly hefty price tag, but worth it. The Personal version is good enough for anyone, and it retails at around $125.
Compatibility : Windows XP and Vista.

Animaatiokone Studio
Description : Animaatiokone Studio is a fully featured program for creating stop motion animation. It does the work and leaves the fun part – animating – to you. Take anything you want to animate, put it in front of a camera and get started.
Purchase for $99 or download the trial version.
Compatibility : Windows XP and Vista.

iKitmovie
Description : IKITMovie (pronounced i-kit-movie) is Stop Motion Animation software. All you need is a PC and a USB webcam or USB streaming camcorder or a Digital Still Camera and you are ready to make your own brickfilms. Price is $49.
Compatibility : Windows XP and Vista.

Lego Stop Motion Tutorials

How to Create a Stop Motion Animation
Description : This is a general, but detailed, 15 step tutorial on stop motion (everyone should bookmark this one). Stop motion animation is not difficult, it is time-consuming, repetitive and requires patience.

How to Make Stop-Motion Video Shorts with Your Digital Camera
Description : Another step by step tutorial on stop motion, this shows you the easiestways to go about shooting, editing and finalizing a your short movie. Very easy tut to follow, with great video presentation.

Brickfilms Tutorial – Basic Steps
Description : First thing to learn is the animating of a minifigure character walking.

Brickfilms Tutorial – Running
Description : This tutorial is slightly more difficult than the previous, showing you a few more tecniques.

Brickfilms Tutorial – Special FX
Description : A tutorial showing you the basics of jumping.

Brickfilms Tutorial – Sound Effects
Description : A basic sound setup for Stop Motion animation should include at least a microphone and a headset or speakers and some audio editing software.

Lego Video Stop Motion Tutorials

How to Make LEGO Stop-Motion Movies

Description : This video will take you through the basics of sets, filming, and editing stop motion movies. In this tutorial they use Windows Movie Maker to edit, but even if you have a different editing program there may still be some helpful tips.

Behind The Bricks

Description : A non-stop tour through the world of Brickfilming, techniques and Crescent Studios.

How to make Lego stop motion using Windows Movie Maker

Description : This video tells you how to make a Lego stop motion animation using Windows Movie Maker.

Basic Stopmotion Tutorial on Filming a Lego Movie

Description : A basic stopmotion turtorial on filming a movie.

Stop Motion PRO Tutorial

Description : A tutorial on how to do stop motion the easy way with the legendary stop motion pro.

How to Make Stop-Motion Part 1

Description : Here is a more advanced tutorial on how to animate. This is only the picture taking process, watch the second part below.

How to Make Stop-Motion Part 2

Description : In this second part the focus is on editing.

Lego Stop Motion Tutorial

Description : A tutorial on how to animate a minifigure using stop motion.

Bluntys Stop-mo 101

Description : A much more detailed peek behind the scenes of Stop-motion animation from the director of the Circle Circle Dot Dot music video (view it in the showcase section of this post), Blunty3000.

Lego Stop Motion Walking Tutorial

Description : Copy the movements of each frame onto your lego minifig, in between movements take a pic and keep repeating the process (including taking pics) until your minifig has reached its destination.

Lego Stop Motion Walking/Running Tutorial

Lego Stop Motion Animation Tutorial

Description : This is a brickfilming tutorial on how to mask in GIMP 2.0. Stop motion animation tutorial.

Stop Motion Tutorial – Building The Set.

Description : How to build a set for your models in your stop motion videos.

Stop Motion Tutorial – Studio Lighting

Description : A short tutorial with advice on setting up your lighting for your animation studio.

Custom Lego Minifigs Tutorial

Description : A Tutorial on how to make the arms of your lego minifig open out more.

Lego Video Stop Motion Downloads

Basic Lego Movie Tutorial

Basic Lego Movie Tutorial – Swordfight

Basic Lego Movie Tutorial – Animator

Basic Lego Movie Tutorial – Dino

Lego Stop Motion Showcase

Building the LEGO Millennium Falcon

The Elevator

Grease – Summer Nights

Lego Stop – Motion

The Bank Robbery

LEGO STOP MOTION

Circle Circle Dot Dot

Lego Beer Song

The Simpsons Intro Lego Style

"Thriller"… with Legos

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Awesome Basic Stop Motion Animation Tutorial with iKITMovie

This tutorial is from one of our sponsors iKITMovie. IKITMovie is a Stop Motion Animation, 3d Animation Software, Claymation Software for Windows XP/Vista/Windows 7 PC’s. The software is very easy to use, my kids use it, making it suitable for any age (from 9 to 99), and, believe me it is a lot of fun.
Anyone that has followed this blog for a long time will know how much I love Lego, of course, my kids love it as well. I have found that iKITMovie has been perfect for making small animated movies with there Lego creations. I will not show you the animations here, but I have encouraged the kids to remake Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade in there own way. So, watch this space!

Anyway, this basic tutorial is an introduction to stop motion animation using clay, and has been put together by our sponsors to demonstrate how easy and how much fun it actually is. You can download iKITMovie here: iKITMovie Homepage.

The finished Movie

Step 1 – Working with Clay

Remove the portion of clay you wish to use from the package and knead it in your hands for a moment. This will help redistribute the plasticizers and polymer fibers in the clay. This is often called “conditioning” the clay. If the clay feels flexible and can be pulled easily without breaking immediately, it is ready to go.
So, to get started with the tutorial, grab a piece of your clay and make sure it is big enough to be split in to 5 equal parts.
Here I am using Sculpey III clay, any clay type or color will work just fine, just make sure it is clean and reasonably consistent in color.

Step 2 – Divide up the clay

Roll the clay out and divide it into 5 equal segments, for this tutorial, we are using Sculpey clay as it does not dry out and can be easily manipulated. Roll each segment up in to a small ball and try to make them all the same size.

Step 3 – Preparing the clay pieces for animating

Squash the balls down to make the 5 shapes shown here.

Step 4 – Creating the set

This is were the creative fun begins! For the simplest set possible, grab a sheet of white paper and set up your webcamera or digital still camera (any camera will do) in front of your prepped clay. Adjust your camera settings and lighting for best results. Use a tripod or something similiar, to ensure that both your camera and the set are secured so they will not move during the snapshots that you will take when you begin animating.
Of course, if you feel like making a more creative set, feel free.

Step 5 – Adjust your Camera

Open up iKITMovie, our animation software of choice, and start a new project. Give it a name such as “Boing” and set the resolution to 800×600, (or 640×480 if your camera cannot handle anything higher). If you are using a digital still camera then set it to take snaps (jpeg) 800×600. And finally, set the frame rate to 15 frames per second.

NOTE – If you are using a digital still camera you will find it very difficult to replace the clay pieces in the exact place between shots. To help you with this, iKITMove has a useful feature called “onionskinning”, which will really help you to find the correct placing of each piece as you take shots. The screenshot shows a ghost image of the previously placed clay piece allowing me to place the next piece in place of it but in the following position in the sequence.

Step 6 – Taking the snapshots

Take 10 snaps of clay piece number 2 first. That is the round shaped clay ball. Then replace it in the exact same position with clay piece number 1. Take one or two snapshots of it. Then use piece 3, but place it slightly in the direction you wish the clay to move. Take a snapshot. Then use piece 4 and move it even further along. And then piece 5. And then place piece 4, 3, 2 and 1 to bring it to a stop, taking a snap of each one as you place it. Repeat this sequence as many times as you wish in whatever direction you wish to extend the length of your movie.

Step 7 – Bringing your movie to life

Any animation or movie will seem very lifeless and dull without sound. Sound fx, music, voiceovers etc will enhance the movie drammically, and most importantly, make the movie fun! iKITMovie has sound fx included so next you will bring things to life by selecting the sound fx that best suit the animation.
In this case we have selected a cartoon type “boing” sound. So scroll down through the list of sounds and select either that one or one that you think might suit.

Step 8 – Repeat and polish

Repeat this for each position of the clay object where you think a sound would be appropriate such as when the clay changes direction etc.
And there you have it, your first stop motion animation movie.
Now you have the basic tools and knowledge to expand on the movie, let your creativity rein free and create something amazing! Have fun.

The finished movie

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