Instructify

BY KEVIN HODGSON

We’ve reviewed GoAnimate here at Instructify before, but the site recently launched a school version of its animation software that is worth writing about because, well, it’s free. With GoAnimate for Schools, teachers can sign up for a free classroom account that provides up to 100 student accounts. While there are some limitations on characters and movie run times (2 minutes), GoAnimate still provides ample possibilities for students to make interesting movies. And in my experience with GoAnimate, young people just love to use the site for all sorts of creative projects.

GoAnimate is a web-based animation system that allows users to add speech bubbles, audio, movement, and more to simple movies. The videos are hosted at the GoAnimate site. On the resource page, there are sample movies, lesson ideas, and more at the school section that run the curricular range of technology, literature, and even community action projects.

GoAnimate for Schools

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Make cartoons easily and freely with GoAnimate

“Xtra” easy animation with Xtranormal’s Text-to-movie

Kids can create movies, drawings and more with Kerpoof

BY BILL FERRIS

Here’s a great example of a creative class project that you and your students can do. Some students in Japan used sticky notes to create a stop-motion version of Mario, the shorter, chubbier Mario brother, stomping goombas and collecting coins throughout their school. Watch the video and try to top this with your next group assignment.

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BY JASON DON FORSYTHE

For a while, Xtranormal was my favorite animation application, but GoAnimate might just give it a run for its money. The interface is intuitive and slapping together a movie really doesn’t take much time at all.

It’s free to sign up for GoAnimate, and you can make a basic characters and animations for free. The site does finance its operations via micro-transactions like buying clothes for a character — want the cartoon fireman’s helmet? It’s going to cost you a few actual pennies. But you can use the basic functionality of the application for free.

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BY KEVIN HODGSON

If we really believe in the axiom of “learning by doing,” then teaching the concept of stopmotion moviemaking should begin with a program like Pivot Stickfigure Animator. Pivot is a freeware program for PCs (an alternative freeware program available for all platforms is called Stykz) that is deceptively simple to use. Users are given a stickfigure to start. By moving the figure and adjusting its various body parts, users create a stopmotion movie, frame by frame.

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BY KEVIN HODGSON

Stopmotion Animator is a freeware download that allows users of PC computers to use a webcam to easily and quickly create stop-motion movies. The software is set up to “grab” frames off the webcam, then gather them together into a single .AVI video file. Stopmotion Animator allows you to tweak some settings as well. For example, you can set the number of frames you want shot with each mouse click (a single frame per shot will make the video more fluid in motion but will take a lot longer to make, so I suggest that the setting be placed at three to five frames per shot).

BY BILL FERRIS

Last year we reviewed Xtranormal Text-to-Movie, a free computer animation app that lets you create your own cartoons. The folks at Xtranormal have made an even more impressive program called State, which adds characters who can walk around, advanced camera movement, movies with multiple scenes, and the ability to record your own voiceovers to your movies for free.

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BY BILL FERRIS

Many years ago, Walt Disney drew a little cartoon mouse who in turn built a theme park with his own four-fingered hands. Or something. Today, your elementary students can create cartoons of their own, as well as stories, drawings, cards and more at Kerpoof, an online creativity site brought to you by Disney.

Kerpoof gets kids creating with a simple interface that has a surprising amount of options. The movie section is particularly impressive — you can have several characters onscreen at once, and direct their movement, actions and speech. Compared to online animation tool Xtranormal, Kerpoof gives you far more control over your characters — Xtranormal’s free version only allows two characters, and they can’t walk around. However, Kerpoof doesn’t allow you to switch camera angles, nor do the characters have voice simulation (which may be a positive, depending on your point of view). (more…)

BY REBECCAH HAINES

Have you ever wanted to make your own animated movie? The script, the soundtrack, the camera angles – if it were all up to you, you’d do an awesome job — probably better than Steven Spielberg, right? Well, move over Steve-o because with Xtranormal’s Text-to-movie website, you can create your own animated flick. Okay, so with the free version of Text-to-movie, your animated features probably won’t win an Oscar, but that doesn’t mean this product isn’t useful in the classroom. With a few simple steps, you or your students can create a movie. (more…)

Lights, camera, action! Looking for a way to bring your students’ book reports, science/social studies projects, or writing projects to life? Let them create a Claymation Movie.

Claymation is a type of stop motion animation created by moving an object in very small amounts and taking a picture between each movement – think the California Raisins or Wallace and Gromit. You then run all of the pictures together at a fast pace to create the illusion that the object(s) are really moving.

Thanks to the low cost and high availability of digital technology, you can create your own claymation movie with only a computer, digital camera, tripod, and clay. You start by placing a clay figure(s) in front of a backdrop. A cut-out box works great for this. You take a digital picture then move the object(s) a very small amount and take another picture. You continue in this sequence until you have moved the object(s) through all of the motions to tell your story. To liven up your movies or create more drama, incorporate props with your clay object(s). You then insert the digital pictures into a program like Movie Maker. You can make the duration of each photo frame as short as necessary to give your clay figure(s) the illusion that they are moving when you play the movie. If you want to enhance your Claymation you can add narration by using Audacity or add some sound effects by using Sound Dogs. -MONIQUE ST.LOUIS

Claymation Movie – Shooting Hoops, courtesy a 2nd grade student in Burke County, NC