Featuring Gabel Eiben and Anne Gridley. Original Music by Lumberob. Filmed in a room at the Ramada Hotel in Antwerp by Pavol Liska and Kelly Copper.
This video is part of a series of stop motion animations that were made in 2011 and 2012 by Nature Theater of Oklahoma as a preparation and exploration for a projected animated film that would eventually become Life and Times - Episode 4.5. The films were composed from individual still photographs shot with a Cannon Mark ii camera in various locations while the company was on tour with Life and Times - Episodes 1 and 2. No one in the company had ever done animated film before, and we were learning as we experimented. Breaking down time into individual still moments was a challenge both for the directors and the actors involved. The individual photographs -- done often over the course of an entire day -- were later assembled in Final Cut at a rate of 10 frames per second to create the motion.
This animation, made again in one of the Antwerp hotel rooms, primarily features the slippers that Pavol's mother had knit for every member of the company. We destroyed one of these slippers which became too attached to the clay we were using to hold it on the wall. The crack in the bed (which was actually two twin beds shoved together) was something that we discovered in the process of making this animation when the actors started to be swallowed up. The ironing board that we were using in every hotel was just not cutting it anymore and the camera slipped over and over again, which was frustrating and led to the shakiness in the framing for this one..
To see other animations in the series, go to: vimeopro.com/oktheater/stop-motion-animations