Screening Stop Motion

Create (or have students make) solid-colour background sheets for stop-motion animation. (You can usually get solid colour sheets of bristol board at dollar stores.)

Use a tablet, phone or digital camera to film short clips (30-60 seconds) of different places in the school. The clips should be wide shots so that they can be used as backgrounds.

You can have students do this step as well if appropriate. Make sure they understand that the clips will be used as backgrounds, so they need to be wide shots and can’t have too much movement or detail in them.

Tell students what the different backgrounds are, and then have them go through the planning process for a stop-motion story set in that location.

Have them film the stop-motion story using the solid-colour background sheets.

During the post-production phase, combine their stop-motion story with the appropriate video clip.

Many stop-motion apps, such as Stop Motion Studio, have green screen functions built in. If the one you are using does not, you will need to create a green screen video with the app and then use a different video editor to do the green screen effect.

When students show their videos, have them explain how the background video they chose to use for green-screening influenced their video. How did it affect the choice of characters and the story?

If you wish, you can have them use the Reflection Recorder.