ToonLoop Remix from Society for Arts and Technology on Vimeo.

Yes, you read that right: realtime stop motion. While stop motion is, by definition, associated with a painstaking process of creating animation frame by frame, a free and open source tool takes a different approach. ToonLoop provides the usual stop motion tools for creating loops, but takes a live performance approach to the recording and playback process, so you can turn your stop motion into a performance. The creator brought up the tool Saturday at the Open Video Conference in New York and got just the reaction you’d expect - a few confused (if delighted) chuckles, and someone asking, “That must be … slow.”

Now, if the framerate is low, you have no one to blame but yourself.

For fans of animation and live visualism, though, this is a dream. The first build was in Processing for Mac and Windows, but a new version for Linux (which should also work on Mac) is built on Python (with PyOpenGL, PyGame, Video4Linux and — oddly — Pure Data for MIDI).

http://toonloop.com/
Developers: Alexandre Quessy and Tristan Matthews
Toonloop Download
Source on Google Code
More documentation of the project at Montreal’s SAT [in French]

In fact, I’m not sure whether I should tell you to download the thing or just run with the idea itself. (There’s no reason Java/Processing shouldn’t still work, by the way, if you use the excellent GSVideo library - and OpenFrameworks and others could be likely candidates, too.)

The idea is brilliant - and yet more evidence that being a visualist can be a much broader category than simply being a “VJ,” with the two-channel mix paradigm the more conventional term suggests.

And performances evidently look like what you might expect. Below, Joy Penroz uses Toonloop in Mérida, Yucatán, México, via the ToonLoop site.

Bonus video: as I was looking for more work done with ToonLoop (there’s not much out there just yet), I came across another creation by Joy Penroz. It’s not a stop motion performance, but it runs with parallel ideas, looping to manipulate time in a modern pop take on the work of Dutch master painter Jan Vermeer. The contemporary “Milkmaid”:

THEMILKMAID from Joy Penroz on Vimeo.

Extra thanks to Michela Ledwidge and Austin Gambles on Twitter.

SCINTILLATION from Xavier Chassaing on Vimeo.

When we talk about “digital” process, it’s often mixing real, physical techniques that can make all the difference. In sound, that may be sampling real sounds, or building your own speakers, or finding physical interfaces. In visuals, it’s finding ways of doing things in the domain of actual light and not just digits.

Xavier Chassaing’s “SCINTILLATION” may wind up being the most beautiful minutes of motion footage we see all year. It seems not a single frame was shot as motion - instead, it was pieced together from some 35,000 photos. That allows for tightly-choreographed depth of field focus shifts that should be impossible, and sudden movements that make it seem as though the very universe is quaking around the fame. It’s stop motion, technically, but a unique kind of stop motion still life.

That’s beautiful enough - and then the orchids seem to be invaded by magical fire fairies. Particles explode into surfaces thanks to even more technically-precise projection mapping, painstakingly painting objects in the film with motion animation. Mathieu Calet did the work on the effects, which remain simple and elegant enough that the orchids and molded ceiling become an even more active canvas.

On top of this, the score is exquisite, the work of fedaden. (It’s well worth checking out his other stuff - I may be coding and editing while listening to more of it.)

The resulting piece seems to have slipped into our world from some other, very gorgeous dimension. It’s a challenge and an inspiration to everything we’re doing. To the whole team, thanks.

It hasn’t been long since we last mentioned fantastic stop-motion animator Pes, but his latest offering takes his already quirky-yet-smooth style and adds considerably more awesome.

PES’ Western Spaghetti from ideals creatives on Vimeo.

The liquid effects here are absolutely wonderful, as are the various chopping and squashing parts. Animation is all about problem solving, and stop-motion doubly so. I spent the first two weeks of this month teaching stop-motion to over 100 9-16 year olds, and it was fascinating to watch them trying to figure out how to get what was in their heads on to the screen. Watching Pes’ work, there’s plenty of “how would I do that?” moments.

[via Make]

Lots of motion in the non-digital world can inspire digital visuals. (Hey, that pretty much sums up all digital photography and videography, eh?) Keeping with this theme, I’m really taken by the flipbook work featured by my friend Bre Pettis at Etsy.com’s online magazine:

The Flipbooks of Etsy: Motion Picture Objects [The Storque]

Bre has interviews with the various makers, some of the talent on online marketplace Etsy.com, and even a dose of the philosophy and technique of creating them.

Properly shot, the flipbook effect looks really lovely on video. (I’ve also done a piece that involved scanning index card notebooks, but shooting them directly is much nicer.) If you’re interested in making some of your own, Bre also includes this tutorial:

Some interesting production techniques used in this video from the Lightsurgeons.

This film was created entirely from the waste collected and produced during the Sapporo ICC International Creative Workshop 2008 that took place between 4th -14th March. It was led by Light Surgeons creatives Chris Allen, Tim Cowie and James Price. The resulting piece of work was informed through the ingenuity, creativity and collaboration of the workshops 16 participants.

More Information.

via VJ.TV.