Ray Harryhausen

Stop Motion is a very specific type of animation and there have been many pioneers that have used stop motion in new ways or formats.

One pioneer of Stop Motion animation was Ray Harryhausen a stop motion animator. He created a brand of Stop Motion called Dynamation. This new type of Stop Motion was designed to be inserted into film to show the models to be interacting with the actors on screen. This is designed to give the viewer a better and more immersive film to watch.

Dynamation: The Technique

Dynamation was a new technique to make stop motion models look and act more realistically within film.
The technique is done using a split screen with rear projection. This however was around for a time before hand but the method of dynamation was not. The first part was showing or filming the film on the rear screen behind anything. This where the film will be played and filmed. Once this was filmed it was placed into a projector and shown onto the rear projection screen.

The next part was using a second screen to add the claymation montser or other special effects to the film. These were added around a  black screen to concentrate on the monster itself. The monster was then moved to look as if it was interacting with the actors in the film. The monster moved frame by frame to give it a realistic motion. This is very time consuming but it gives the look of fluid motion.

They were some flaws with this technique. Including the example above where it took a logn tiem to process there were other flaws that couldn't be corrected. One example was colour and brightness of each scene. This would of caused a lot of continuity errors and could ruin the film or at least break the immersion value of the film. Another problem is that the actors could not go infront of the models only ever behind them. This however was changed when a back panel was added alloing the models to be placed behind the actors.

Some films that used Dynamation include

The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953)

It came from Beneath the Sea (1954)  

Jason and the Argonauts (1963)

Clash of the Titans (1981)