Stop motion film is still alive in the digital world.

Students ages 11 to 14 were learning all about stop motion animation this week in the Tarble Arts Center.

Gabe Przygoda, a graduate student, is the instructor for the stop motion film workshop.

Przygoda said stop motion film is an easy concept to learn.

“It’s just point-to-point animation that is an easy concept for these guys to grasp,” he said.

The students are using digital cameras and Windows Movie Maker to produce three projects: claymation, white board cartooning and object animation.

Przygoda said actions of the characters have to be relied on to tell the story and occasionally use word bubbles.

“It’s almost like making a silent film to some extent,” Przygoda said.

He said the key to stop motion is being able to break down actions into frames.

“One of the things you have to think about is just breaking down motion into photos, frames per second,” Przygoda said.

He said that professional studios shoot at 12 frames per second or higher, but in this workshop they are shooting at eight frames per second to make it a little easier for the students to learn.

“So, we try and teach them to break down movements into eight frames a second,” Przygoda said.

Przygoda said he also teaches students that smaller movements make for better video to capture full motion.

He said he enjoys teaching children how to produce video.

“I like getting kids involved in videos, and this is an easy way where you don’t have to have a lot of expensive equipment,” Przygoda said.

He said all that they need is a digital camera and basic editing software.

Przygoda said he enjoys teaching younger students because of their creativity.

For the first hour of the workshop, Przygoda said he teaches the basics of stop motion, and then the students come up with characters, sets and a story line.

Przygoda said stop motion is still being used by advertisers and movie studios, but is used more by advertisers.

Marcus Smith can be reached

at 581-2812 or masmith6@eiu.