5 Tips for Making Stop Motion Videos on your Smartphone
Today we’re going to show you how to create this fun video using our stop motion app, Life Lapse, and share some of our tips for making stop motion videos from your phone!
What you will need to make this video:
Pineapple
Can of pineapple OR a second pineapple to blend
Straw
Umbrella
Glass
A backdrop stand or a chair
A backdrop or poster paper in the colour of your choice
Cutting board and knife
Turkey Baster (optional)
Setting up your studio
Whether you have access to a studio for filming your video or will be creating a photo studio at home, you’ll want to get your studio set up before you begin. For stop motion, it is very important that you have consistent lighting because if you are filming near a window, you will see flicking exposure throughout the video if there is sun and cloud. If it is overcast, add a strong light beside the window so it can overpower the outdoor lighting. For our example, we will be using a panel light that allows us to change the color temperature and power.
When making stop motion, it is important to have a tripod and remote so that the video is seamless when the images are pieced together. The focus is on the objects that are moving in your stop motion video; you do not want the frame moving as you are filming as it will appear sloppy when the video is playing at a super high speed. You can find inexpensive cell phone tripod mounts that are adaptable to any tripod. You can find a list of our recommended stop motion film equipment here.
Tip #1: If you don’t have a tripod or a remote, try placing your phone against something sturdy or placing it into a cup and use our timer features in Life Lapse. Be sure to enable both the self timer and the interval timer so that it will automatically capture a photo every few seconds. This will allow you to be hands-free as you are filming and prevent any potential movement of your phone. Don’t worry about being in the clips as you are arranging the objects because you’ll be able to go in later to remove any images you don’t need.
Tip #2: You don’t need a big, fancy backdrop to create product photos or videos. We like to use poster paper that you can find at any craft store or dollar store. Craft stores typically will have a range of great colors as well. With the poster paper, put a chair on top of the surface that you’ll be using for your video and place the poster paper behind and tape it to the chair as your backdrop stand.
Read this post if you want to learn how to set up a home photography studio to create product photos and videos for marketing.
Framing your shot
Next up is to figure out the motion that will happen. In this example, we are going to make the pineapple spin and become smaller while the glass fills up with pineapple juice. It will end with a slice of pineapple on the glass and an umbrella pick and straw inside the glass.
When filming in our Life Lapse app, you can film in two size options: Instagram square or Instagram vertical. You can also adjust the size once you finish filming.
Preparing your video concept
You’ll want to prepare as much as you can before you begin filming. For this concept, we’ll need to have the juice ready before we start filming as we don’t want to be cutting and blending the juice in between shots; the only thing we’ll need to do once we start filming to fill the cup with juice, cut a bit of the pineapple off each time and use our Ghost feature to line it up between shots.
Tip #3: A turkey baster is great for shooting anything liquid as it gives you more control of where it goes.
Tip #4: When filming stop motion on your phone, be sure to turn off your auto lock in your settings so that your screen does not turn off while you’re filming. Again, we want to avoid touching the phone as much as possible to prevent movement of the frame. Your phone will lock itself even if you are using the app to automatically capture as the phone will not recognize that you’re using the phone when you don’t touch it.
Tip #5: In Life Lapse, you can lock the exposure and white balance so that it doesn’t re-expose the shots when you are moving objects in and out of the frame.
You’ll want to find a position where you are not impacting the lighting and will not cast a shadow in your frame. Place your cutting board and knife where you plan to be slicing the pineapple between shots and don’t slice it on the same surface as your frame as it could lead to movement of the frame.
Shooting your video
Start with a first image of the pineapple and the empty glass. Next fill the glass with some juice using the turkey baster. In the case that you accidentally get juice on the side of the glass, try your best to clean the glass without moving it or if you do end up moving it, you can use our Ghost feature to line it back up. Take the pineapple away and slice off a piece from the bottom of the pineapple and use the Ghost feature to line it up. When lining it up, be sure to turn it slightly from your original position to get the turning effect. Shoot your next image or let the Interval timer film your clips for you. Continue to repeat this until you reach the end of the pineapple and the glass is full with juice.
Once you’ve completed this step, add a slice of the pineapple to the glass and move the pineapple around the glass to create some more animation to your stop motion video. We’ll then add the umbrella opening and the straw to finish off the video. With the pineapple slice, umbrella and straw, you’ll want to use tiny movements because if you move too quickly, the animation will flash before your eyes when converted into stop motion.
Editing and sharing your video
When you’re done, you can play it to see how it looks! Life Lapse will take all the images that you captured and piece it together into a stop motion video. If you chose the interval timer, head to the timeline and remove any images with you in it. Play with the speed (for this example, we’ll choose a faster speed and boomerang it to loop the video), change the size, add music or filters straight from the app. Learn more about all of our app features here.
If you want to hold the end a little longer, you can go to your last clip and duplicate it. The more duplications of the same frame, the longer the clip will hold.
Now you’re complete! We hope you enjoyed this tutorial and our tips for filming stop motion videos from your smartphone. If you tried this tutorial, tag us at @lifelapse_app or use hashtag #LifeLapse to share with us - we’d love to see!