Last week as part of Gold Plus, I facilitated an animation workshop alongside Hannah WW in which a very excitable Flo and Sam took part in. Although I saw that the most beneficial route to go down was to leave people to play and observe through doing, I initiated the session by explaining briefly why I like animation, and discussing the endless opportunities the technique offers creatives. I then handed over to Hannah who explained how I Can Animate software works (I need to get my hands on this software myself!) and let Flo and Sam get stuck in.
I used this time to observe the two working and make small suggestions as questions and problems arose – for instance, lighting and background consistency, the effect of timing, creating comprehendible movement etc, but otherwise letting them explore the software and technique. Mistakes, practise and patience are the way to get around the discipline!

I’d prepared a short introduction in how to use Photoshop to create GIFs as they are a less time/material-consuming method of practising animation techniques, however I only had access to Photoshop Elements which wouldn’t allow me to create a timeline for animating. It was a shame I couldn’t share this easily transferable skill but I see the value in exploring stop-motion as an introduction to animation.