The Art (and Science) of Stop-Motion Animation | Brian McLean | TED

Quick Overview

Brian McLean discusses how Laika studio uses 3D printing technology, specifically color 3D printing, to create thousands of unique, high-fidelity facial expressions (voxels) for their stop-motion animation puppets, drastically speeding up the animation process compared to traditional methods.

Key Points: Laika spent 35 years trying to capture moments using drawings, paintings, sculptures, photography, and home movies before embracing modern techniques. The speaker, Brian McLean, was forced to study the science behind animation, focusing on the Principle of Persistence of Vision. Modern stop-motion animation, like that used in Laika films (Coraline, ParaNorman, BoxTrolls, Kubo, Missing Link), utilizes 3D printing to create replacement faces, with one character in 'Missing Link' requiring 106,000 unique printed faces. The color 3D printing technology slices digital models into hundreds or thousands of 2D images (voxels) and prints them layer by layer, allowing for complex, multi-colored parts. A single voxel is tiny (42x42x27 micrometers), and the final printed objects are highly detailed, combining hard and soft materials. The process allows animators to quickly swap parts, like faces, in real-time (e.g., changing a face in 3 seconds vs. the time it took to animate a single blink previously). The speaker demonstrates the speed by showing how an animator can move a puppet's arm back and forth in 24 frames per second, which is much faster than traditional methods.

Context: Brian McLean, from Laika stop-motion animation studio, presents how the studio dramatically advanced its production capabilities by integrating 3D printing technology into the stop-motion process. This shift allowed them to move beyond painstaking manual creation of every subtle facial expression to mass-producing highly detailed, multi-colored facial replacements for their puppets, effectively bridging the gap between digital precision and physical animation.

Detailed Analysis

Brian McLean explains that Laika studio has evolved its stop-motion techniques significantly over 35 years, moving from traditional methods like drawing and sculpting to leveraging advanced 3D printing. He highlights that the human brain relies on the Principle of Persistence of Vision to perceive motion from sequential images. For their film 'Missing Link,' they printed over 106,000 unique faces. The color 3D printing process involves taking a digital model and slicing it into thousands of 2D cross-sections (voxels), which are then printed layer-by-layer using a mix of colored resins and white/clear powder. This method allows them to create replacement parts—like faces with bone, tissue, muscle, veins, and skin textures—with high fidelity and uniqueness, which can then be magnetically snapped onto the puppets. This technology accelerates production, enabling animators to execute complex movements, like blinking, much faster than traditional methods, which could take days for a single short action.