hi,i am going to be doing a stopmotion film where my character turns into super man, but how do i make him look like he is flying?
Thanks.

someone help me please.

I've no idea, but I bet within the next day or two you will get plenty of help

thanks jills

What you use is called a rig. A rig holds up your puppet during animation and the rig needs to be edited out in post production.

To make a rig....

You can incorporate a piece of K&S (Square brass tubing in different sizes that slot into each other) in the puppet's armature on the side of his spinal wire. Leave a hole in the clay or foam that covers your puppet for easy acess and then twist together 6 or 7 lengths of wire in a drill for the rig, or use thicker wire like 1/8 " or 1/4". Then glue or solder a smaller piece of K&S onto the end and then the wire rig will slot into the puppets side in a strong locked in position. Then you could either clamp the wire into a little vice or a C-clamp to hold it there. But the best bet would be to use a little climpex which can be articulated and hold your rig very firmly.

Since the rig will be on the side of the puppet it won't be seen, but it all depends on your camera angle

Wow thanks alot Nofby both of you are so kind and do you know any free editing programs that you can use green/blue screen on thanks.

Erm, I'm afraid if you want the best results you will have to pay. Buy aftereffects, it is reaaly a great program and worth the money

how much is after effects?

if your on a tight budget you could use very fine clear fishing wire. but its not so good as nofbys advice but it will do the job

Latest release is $1000...about £500 in english pound sterling.

You could, put a sturdy rig is better for flying as the puppet has to be suspended firmly in the air.

you can get a piece of glass with your set behind it...or perspex then stick your character to it that is an easier method but sometimes a reflection can come off the glass

nofbys right. his advice is the best way to get your model to fly, i was only giving you an idea of a cheap way but its not very professional

thanks guys

hey nofby do you have any pictures of a flying rig? i understand better with pictures.

I don't know if it will be useful, but I recalled this bit from Cracking Animation p. 148 about flying through the air:

"Another difficult part of this sequence was animating the Penguin after he has been shot up in the air and then falls to earth against a background of sky and clouds. Rather than try to show the Penguin in motion against a fixed background, we photographed him on glass with a parallel sky positioned behind him. In the following frames the Penguin is largely still, though from time to time we altered the position of his feet and the sack across his shoulder. The illusion of falling comes mainly from the sky itself, which we moved from side to side during a series of long exposures. This was a variant on the blurred-wallpaper effect which occurs earlier in the train chase."

I know you want your character to fly, not fall, Chesee, but you get the picture If you want to go the route of digital edit, they used Apple's Shake program on COTWR and there is a little info on that here: http://www.cgw.com/ME2/dirmod.asp?sid=&nm=&type=Publishing&mod=Publications%3A%3AArticle&mid=8F3A7027421841978F18BE895F87F791&tier=4&id=EEBBF7F52A884125818E77256EEA6575
Nofby's advice of just keeping the rig out of camera view seems very good though.

you can get editing software to cut out the rig if you are not on a tight budget

Thanks alot jills.

I forgot to say until now that there are also tips in Cracking Animation for filming with the glass technique without getting a lot of glare or having it look different from other scenes.

yeah the adam short used glass it is a good book and i might use the same technique for salt and pepper spray

use adobe dreamwaver CS3 to edit it out

hi purple and brown is dreamwaver cs3 free?

really expensive like £500

somethin like dat

i found somthin else called Paint.NET (free)

If you buy '3 Cracking Aventures' Dvd, there is a feature on where they made Gromit's plane fly in A Grand day out.

this used fishing line

I use adaobe photoshop to edit my wires out. which hold my models

An easy way is to put it on strings that are so thin the camera would hardly pick them up.

u could also take a photo of your set with no character on it, print it and put it down on a flat surface (e.g- a table),put your model onto its side on the photo and film it flying up-its free!!

I think that way would work best with greenscreen.