Clay animation
Encyclopedia
Clay animation or claymation is one of many forms of stop motion
animation. Each animated piece, either character or background, is "deformable"—made of a malleable substance, usually Plasticine
clay
.
All traditional animation
is produced in a similar fashion, whether done through cel animation or stop motion
. Each frame, or still picture, is recorded on film or digital media
and then played back in rapid succession. When played back at a frame rate
greater than 10–12 frames per second, a fairly convincing illusion of continuous motion is achieved. While the playback feature creating an illusion is true of all moving images (from zoetrope
to film
s to videogames
), the techniques involved in creating CGI
are generally removed from a frame-by-frame process.
, usually around a wire skeleton called an armature. As in other forms of object animation
, the object is arranged on the set (background), a film frame
is exposed, and the object or character is then moved slightly by hand. Another frame is taken, and the object is moved slightly again. This cycle is repeated until the animator has achieved the desired amount of film. The human mind
processes the series of slightly changing, rapidly playing images as motion, hence making it appear that the object is moving by itself. To achieve the best results, a consistent shooting environment is needed to maintain the illusion of continuity
. This means paying special attention to maintaining consistent lighting and object placement and working in a calm environment.
A subvariation of clay animation can be informally called "clay melting". Any kind of heat source can be applied on or near (or below) clay to cause it to melt while an animation camera
on a time-lapse
setting slowly films the process. An example of this can be seen in Vinton's early short clay-animated film "Closed Mondays" (coproduced by animator Bob Gardiner
) at the end of the computer sequence. A similar technique was used in the climax scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark
to "melt" the faces of the antagonists.
"Freeform" clay animation is an informal term referring to the process in which the shape of the clay changes radically as the animation progresses, such as in the work of Eliot Noyes, Jr. and Ivan Stang
's animated films. Clay can also take the form of "character" clay animation, where the clay maintains a recognizable character throughout a shot, as in Art Clokey
's and Will Vinton's films.
One variation of clay animation is strata-cut animation
, in which a long bread-like loaf of clay, internally packed tight and loaded with varying imagery, is sliced into thin sheets, with the camera taking a frame of the end of the loaf for each cut, eventually revealing the movement of the internal images within. Pioneered in both clay and blocks of wax by German animator Oskar Fischinger
during the 1920s and 1930s, the technique was revived and highly refined in the mid-1990s by David Daniels, an associate of Will Vinton
, in his 16-minute short film
"Buzz Box".
Another clay-animation technique, one that blurs the distinction between stop motion and traditional flat animation, is called clay painting
(also a variation of the direct manipulation animation
process), wherein clay is placed on a flat surface and moved like wet oil paints (as on a traditional artist's canvas) to produce any style of images, but with a clay look to them.
Nevertheless, in 1921, clay animation appeared in a film called "Modeling", an Out of the Inkwell film from the newly formed Fleischer Brothers studio. "Modeling" is one of the few known shorts using clay that was released during the 1920s. "Modeling" included animated clay in eight shots, a novel integration of the technique into an existing cartoon series and one of the rare uses of clay animation in a theatrical short from the 1920s.
Pioneering the clay-painting technique was one-time Vinton animator Joan Gratz, first in her Oscar-nominated film The Creation (1980), and then in her Oscar-winning Mona Lisa Descending a Staircase, filmed in 1992.
In 1972, at Marc Chinoy's Cineplast Films Studio in Munich, Germany, André Roche
created a set of clay-animated German-language-instruction films (for non-German-speaking children) called Kli-Kla-Klawitter
for the Second German TV-Channel; and another one for a traffic education series, Herr Daniel paßt auf ("Mr. Daniel Pays Attention").
A variation of clay animation was developed by another Vinton animator, Craig Bartlett
, for his series of Arnold short films (also made in the '90s), in which he not only used clay painting but sometimes built up clay images that rose off the plane of the flat support platform toward the camera lens
to give a more 3-D stop-motion look to his films.
Some of the best-known clay-animated works include the Gumby
series of television show segments (created by Art Clokey
), the TV commercial made for the California Raisin Advisory Board
by Vinton's studio and The WB's The PJs, produced by and featuring the voice of Eddie Murphy. Clay animation has also been used in Academy Award
-winning short films such as "Closed Mondays" (Will Vinton and Bob Gardiner, 1974), "The Sand Castle" (1977), "Creature Comforts
" (Aardman, 1989), and all four Wallace & Gromit short films, created by Nick Park
of Aardman Animations
. Aardman also created The Presentators, a series of one-minute clay-animation/CGI short films aired on Nickelodeon UK
. Some clay animations appear online, on such sites as Newgrounds
.
Several computer games have also been produced using clay animation, including The Neverhood
, Clay Fighter, Platypus
, Clay Moon (iPhone app), and Primal Rage
. Television commercials
have also utilized the clay animation, such as the Chevron Cars
ads, produced by Aardman Studios. Besides commercials, clay animation has also been popularized in recent years by children's shows such as Bob the Builder
and The Koala Brothers
, as well as adult-oriented shows on Cartoon Network
's Adult Swim
lineup, including Robot Chicken
(which uses clay animation and action figure
s as stop-motion puppets in conjunction) and Moral Orel
. Many independent young filmmakers have used clay animation features for internet viewing.
Flushed Away
is a CGI
replication of clay animation.
Probably the most spectacular use of model animation for a computer game was for the Virgin Interactive Entertainment Mythos
game Magic and Mayhem
(1998), for which stop-motion animator and special-effects expert Alan Friswell constructed over 25 monsters and mythological characters utilising both modelling clay and latex rubber, over wire and ball-and-socket skeletons. Rather than building the models in the cartoon-like style of Wallace and Gromit
, Friswell constructed the figures after the designs of Willis O'Brien
and Ray Harryhausen
to make them more compatible with the game's often violent playing tactics.
, registered by Will Vinton
in 1978 to describe his clay-animated films. While the word is not considered a genericized trademark
, it has become a trademark that is often used generically in the U.S. and is also a term used in the UK to refer to any animation using Plasticine
or similar substance.
Stop motion
Stop motion is an animation technique to make a physically manipulated object appear to move on its own. The object is moved in small increments between individually photographed frames, creating the illusion of movement when the series of frames is played as a continuous sequence...
animation. Each animated piece, either character or background, is "deformable"—made of a malleable substance, usually Plasticine
Plasticine
Plasticine, a brand of modelling clay, is a putty-like modelling material made from calcium salts, petroleum jelly and aliphatic acids. The name is a registered trademark of Flair Leisure Products plc...
clay
Clay
Clay is a general term including many combinations of one or more clay minerals with traces of metal oxides and organic matter. Geologic clay deposits are mostly composed of phyllosilicate minerals containing variable amounts of water trapped in the mineral structure.- Formation :Clay minerals...
.
Animation
Animation is the rapid display of a sequence of images of 2-D or 3-D artwork or model positions in order to create an illusion of movement. The effect is an optical illusion of motion due to the phenomenon of persistence of vision, and can be created and demonstrated in several ways...
is produced in a similar fashion, whether done through cel animation or stop motion
Stop motion
Stop motion is an animation technique to make a physically manipulated object appear to move on its own. The object is moved in small increments between individually photographed frames, creating the illusion of movement when the series of frames is played as a continuous sequence...
. Each frame, or still picture, is recorded on film or digital media
Digital media
Digital media is a form of electronic media where data is stored in digital form. It can refer to the technical aspect of storage and transmission Digital media is a form of electronic media where data is stored in digital (as opposed to analog) form. It can refer to the technical aspect of...
and then played back in rapid succession. When played back at a frame rate
Frame rate
Frame rate is the frequency at which an imaging device produces unique consecutive images called frames. The term applies equally well to computer graphics, video cameras, film cameras, and motion capture systems...
greater than 10–12 frames per second, a fairly convincing illusion of continuous motion is achieved. While the playback feature creating an illusion is true of all moving images (from zoetrope
Zoetrope
A zoetrope is a device that produces an illusion of action from a rapid succession of static pictures. The term zoetrope is from the Greek words "ζωή – zoe", "life" and τρόπος – tropos, "turn". It may be taken to mean "wheel of life"....
to film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
s to videogames
VideoGames
VideoGames may refer to:*VideoGames, a mid-1990s magazine about video games.*Video games in general....
), the techniques involved in creating CGI
Computer-generated imagery
Computer-generated imagery is the application of the field of computer graphics or, more specifically, 3D computer graphics to special effects in art, video games, films, television programs, commercials, simulators and simulation generally, and printed media...
are generally removed from a frame-by-frame process.
Technique
In clay animation, each object is sculpted in clay or a similarly pliable material such as PlasticinePlasticine
Plasticine, a brand of modelling clay, is a putty-like modelling material made from calcium salts, petroleum jelly and aliphatic acids. The name is a registered trademark of Flair Leisure Products plc...
, usually around a wire skeleton called an armature. As in other forms of object animation
Object animation
Object animation is a form of stop motion animation that involves the animated movements of any non-drawn objects such as toys, blocks, dolls, etc...
, the object is arranged on the set (background), a film frame
Film frame
In filmmaking, video production, animation, and related fields, a film frame or video frame is one of the many still images which compose the complete moving picture...
is exposed, and the object or character is then moved slightly by hand. Another frame is taken, and the object is moved slightly again. This cycle is repeated until the animator has achieved the desired amount of film. The human mind
Mind
The concept of mind is understood in many different ways by many different traditions, ranging from panpsychism and animism to traditional and organized religious views, as well as secular and materialist philosophies. Most agree that minds are constituted by conscious experience and intelligent...
processes the series of slightly changing, rapidly playing images as motion, hence making it appear that the object is moving by itself. To achieve the best results, a consistent shooting environment is needed to maintain the illusion of continuity
Continuity (fiction)
In fiction, continuity is consistency of the characteristics of persons, plot, objects, places and events seen by the reader or viewer over some period of time...
. This means paying special attention to maintaining consistent lighting and object placement and working in a calm environment.
Production
Producing a stop-motion animation using clay is extremely laborious. Normal film runs at 24 frames per second (frame/s). With the standard practice of "doubles" or "twos" (double-framing, exposing two frames for each shot), 12 changes are usually made for one second of film movement. For a 30-minute movie, there would be approximately 21,600 stops to change the figures for the frames. For a full-length (90-minute) movie, there would be approximately 64,800 stops, and possibly far more if parts were shot with "singles" or "ones" (one frame exposed for each shot). Great care must be taken to ensure that the object is not altered by accident, by even slight smudges, dirt, hair, or even dust. For feature-length productions, the use of clay has generally been supplanted by rubber silicone and resin-cast components. One foam-rubber process has been coined as "Foamation" by Will Vinton. However, clay remains a viable animation material where a particular aesthetic is desired.A subvariation of clay animation can be informally called "clay melting". Any kind of heat source can be applied on or near (or below) clay to cause it to melt while an animation camera
Animation camera
An animation camera, a type of rostrum camera, is a movie camera specially adapted for frame-by-frame shooting animation or stop motion. It consists of a camera body with lens and film magazines, a stand that allows the camera to be raised and lowered, and a table, often with both top and...
on a time-lapse
Time-lapse
Time-lapse photography is a cinematography technique whereby the frequency at which film frames are captured is much lower than that which will be used to play the sequence back. When replayed at normal speed, time appears to be moving faster and thus lapsing...
setting slowly films the process. An example of this can be seen in Vinton's early short clay-animated film "Closed Mondays" (coproduced by animator Bob Gardiner
Bob Gardiner
James Robbins Gardiner was an animator who helped pioneer what would become known as Claymation. He was born in Torrance, California and died in Grass Valley, California. He received an Oscar in 1974 for his short film Closed Mondays, which he made in partnership with Will Vinton.-External links:...
) at the end of the computer sequence. A similar technique was used in the climax scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, produced by George Lucas, and starring Harrison Ford. It is the first film in the Indiana Jones franchise...
to "melt" the faces of the antagonists.
Types
Clay animation can take several forms:"Freeform" clay animation is an informal term referring to the process in which the shape of the clay changes radically as the animation progresses, such as in the work of Eliot Noyes, Jr. and Ivan Stang
Ivan Stang
Rev. Ivan Stang, born Douglass St. Clair Smith August 21, 1953 in Washington, D.C., raised in Fort Worth, Texas, and attended the St. Mark's School of Texas. He is best known as the author and publisher of the first screed of the Church of the SubGenius...
's animated films. Clay can also take the form of "character" clay animation, where the clay maintains a recognizable character throughout a shot, as in Art Clokey
Art Clokey
Arthur "Art" Clokey was a pioneer in the popularization of stop motion clay animation, beginning in 1955 with a film experiment called Gumbasia, influenced by his professor, Slavko Vorkapich, at the University of Southern California.After the Gumbasia project, Art Clokey and his wife Ruth came up...
's and Will Vinton's films.
One variation of clay animation is strata-cut animation
Strata-cut animation
Strata-cut animation, also spelled stratcut or straticut, is a form of clay animation, itself one of many forms of stop motion animation....
, in which a long bread-like loaf of clay, internally packed tight and loaded with varying imagery, is sliced into thin sheets, with the camera taking a frame of the end of the loaf for each cut, eventually revealing the movement of the internal images within. Pioneered in both clay and blocks of wax by German animator Oskar Fischinger
Oskar Fischinger
Oskar Fischinger was a German-American abstract animator, filmmaker, and painter. He made over 50 short animated films, and painted c. 800 canvases, many of which are in museums, galleries and collections worldwide. Among his film works is Motion Painting No. 1 , which is now listed on the...
during the 1920s and 1930s, the technique was revived and highly refined in the mid-1990s by David Daniels, an associate of Will Vinton
Will Vinton
Will Vinton is an American director and producer of animated films. He was born in McMinnville, Oregon, near Portland. He has won an Oscar for his work, and several Emmy Awards and Clio Awards for the work of his studio.- Education :...
, in his 16-minute short film
Short subject
A short film is any film not long enough to be considered a feature film. No consensus exists as to where that boundary is drawn: the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes or less, including all...
"Buzz Box".
Another clay-animation technique, one that blurs the distinction between stop motion and traditional flat animation, is called clay painting
Clay painting
Clay painting animation is a form of clay animation, which is one of the many kinds of stop motion animation. It blurs the distinction between clay animation, cel animation and cutout animation....
(also a variation of the direct manipulation animation
Direct manipulation animation
One of the many forms of stop motion, but certainly blurring the distinction between stop motion and regular flat animation.Direct manipulation is a simplified variation of graphic animation which involves the frame-by-frame altering a single drawing or graphic image, while taking a frame of film...
process), wherein clay is placed on a flat surface and moved like wet oil paints (as on a traditional artist's canvas) to produce any style of images, but with a clay look to them.
History
Clay-animated films were produced in the United States as early as 1908, when Edison Manufacturing released a trick film entitled The Sculptor's Welsh Rarebit Dream. In 1916, clay animation became something of a fad, as an East Coast artist named Helena Smith Dayton and a West Coast animator named Willie Hopkins produced clay-animated films on a wide range of subjects. Hopkins in particular was quite prolific, producing over fifty clay-animated segments for the weekly Universal Screen Magazine. By the 1920s, cartoon animation using either cels or the slash system was firmly established as the dominant mode of animation production. Increasingly, three-dimensional forms such as clay were driven into relative obscurity as the cel method became the preferred method for the studio cartoon.Nevertheless, in 1921, clay animation appeared in a film called "Modeling", an Out of the Inkwell film from the newly formed Fleischer Brothers studio. "Modeling" is one of the few known shorts using clay that was released during the 1920s. "Modeling" included animated clay in eight shots, a novel integration of the technique into an existing cartoon series and one of the rare uses of clay animation in a theatrical short from the 1920s.
Pioneering the clay-painting technique was one-time Vinton animator Joan Gratz, first in her Oscar-nominated film The Creation (1980), and then in her Oscar-winning Mona Lisa Descending a Staircase, filmed in 1992.
In 1972, at Marc Chinoy's Cineplast Films Studio in Munich, Germany, André Roche
André Roche
André Roche, born in 1952 in France, is an artist, an illustrator and an author of comics and children's books.- Biography :André Roche received a Bachelor’s degree of Tourism, Hotel Administration and Culinary Arts from the Lycée Hôtelier Alexandre Dumas in Strasbourg...
created a set of clay-animated German-language-instruction films (for non-German-speaking children) called Kli-Kla-Klawitter
Kli-Kla-Klawitter
Kli-Kla-Klawitter is a German television series....
for the Second German TV-Channel; and another one for a traffic education series, Herr Daniel paßt auf ("Mr. Daniel Pays Attention").
A variation of clay animation was developed by another Vinton animator, Craig Bartlett
Craig Bartlett
Craig Michael Bartlett is an animator best known for writing for Rugrats and creating the television series Hey Arnold!.-Career:...
, for his series of Arnold short films (also made in the '90s), in which he not only used clay painting but sometimes built up clay images that rose off the plane of the flat support platform toward the camera lens
Photographic lens
A camera lens is an optical lens or assembly of lenses used in conjunction with a camera body and mechanism to make images of objects either on photographic film or on other media capable of storing an image chemically or electronically.While in principle a simple convex lens will suffice, in...
to give a more 3-D stop-motion look to his films.
Some of the best-known clay-animated works include the Gumby
Gumby
Gumby is a green clay humanoid character created and modeled by Art Clokey, who also created Davey and Goliath. Gumby has been the subject of a 233-episode series of American television as well as a feature-length film and other media...
series of television show segments (created by Art Clokey
Art Clokey
Arthur "Art" Clokey was a pioneer in the popularization of stop motion clay animation, beginning in 1955 with a film experiment called Gumbasia, influenced by his professor, Slavko Vorkapich, at the University of Southern California.After the Gumbasia project, Art Clokey and his wife Ruth came up...
), the TV commercial made for the California Raisin Advisory Board
California Raisin Advisory Board
The California Raisin Advisory Board , Fresno, California, is most notable for the use of The California Raisins to market their namesake product, raisins.It was abolished in 1994. There is now a California Raisin Marketing Board....
by Vinton's studio and The WB's The PJs, produced by and featuring the voice of Eddie Murphy. Clay animation has also been used in Academy Award
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
-winning short films such as "Closed Mondays" (Will Vinton and Bob Gardiner, 1974), "The Sand Castle" (1977), "Creature Comforts
Creature Comforts
Creature Comforts was originally a 1989 British humorous animated short film about how animals feel about living in a zoo, featuring the voices of the British public "spoken" by the animals. It was created by Nick Park and Aardman Animations...
" (Aardman, 1989), and all four Wallace & Gromit short films, created by Nick Park
Nick Park
Nicholas Wulstan "Nick" Park, CBE is an English filmmaker of stop motion animation best known as the creator of Wallace and Gromit and Shaun the Sheep....
of Aardman Animations
Aardman Animations
Aardman Animations, Ltd., also known as Aardman Studios, or simply as Aardman, is a British animation studio based in Bristol, United Kingdom. The studio is known for films made using stop-motion clay animation techniques, particularly those featuring Plasticine characters Wallace and Gromit...
. Aardman also created The Presentators, a series of one-minute clay-animation/CGI short films aired on Nickelodeon UK
Nickelodeon UK
Nickelodeon is a children's television channel available on Sky, Virgin Media, Smallworld Cable, TalkTalk TV and UPC Ireland in the United Kingdom and Ireland, including on demand on BT Vision. The channel was launched on 1 September 1993...
. Some clay animations appear online, on such sites as Newgrounds
Newgrounds
Newgrounds is an American entertainment and social media website. Founded on July 6, 1995 by Tom Fulp, the site primarily hosts Adobe Flash animations and games, but also features a music-oriented page, along with an art portal...
.
Several computer games have also been produced using clay animation, including The Neverhood
The Neverhood
The Neverhood is a 1996 PC CD-ROM adventure video game created by animator Doug TenNapel and released by DreamWorks Studios. It features claymation graphics and music by composer Terry Scott Taylor...
, Clay Fighter, Platypus
Platypus (game)
.The music in both Platypus and Platypus 2 on all platforms except iPhone consists of various remixes of Commodore 64 game tunes by various Commodore 64 composers, and performed by various remixers of Commodore 64 music. They originally appeared on CDs from the C64Audio.com label, and were licenced...
, Clay Moon (iPhone app), and Primal Rage
Primal Rage
Primal Rage is a versus fighting game developed and published by Atari Games in 1994 as an arcade video game. Toys, comics, a novel and other merchandise tie-ins were also produced.-Storyline:...
. Television commercials
Television advertisement
A television advertisement or television commercial, often just commercial, advert, ad, or ad-film – is a span of television programming produced and paid for by an organization that conveys a message, typically one intended to market a product...
have also utilized the clay animation, such as the Chevron Cars
Chevron Cars
The Chevron Cars are part of an advertising campaign of the Chevron Corporation consisting of television spots, print ads, billboards, and toy cars available at Chevron retail locations.-History:...
ads, produced by Aardman Studios. Besides commercials, clay animation has also been popularized in recent years by children's shows such as Bob the Builder
Bob the Builder
Bob the Builder is a British children's animated television show created by Keith Chapman. In the original series Bob appears as a building contractor specialising in masonry in a stop motion animated programme with his colleague Wendy, various neighbours and friends, and their gang of...
and The Koala Brothers
The Koala Brothers
The Koala Brothers is an animated children's television show that features the adventures of two brothers, Frank and Buster, as they seek to help their neighbors in a sleepy town in the Australian Outback...
, as well as adult-oriented shows on Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network is a name of television channels worldwide created by Turner Broadcasting which used to primarily show animated programming. The channel began broadcasting on October 1, 1992 in the United States....
's Adult Swim
Adult Swim
Adult Swim is an adult-oriented Cable network that shares channel space with Cartoon Network from 9:00 pm until 6:00 am ET/PT in the United States, and broadcasts in countries such as Australia and New Zealand...
lineup, including Robot Chicken
Robot Chicken
Robot Chicken is an American stop motion animated television series created and executive produced by Seth Green and Matthew Senreich along with co-head writers Douglas Goldstein and Tom Root. Green provides many voices for the show...
(which uses clay animation and action figure
Action figure
An action figure is a posable character figurine, made of plastic or other materials, and often based upon characters from a film, comic book, video game, or television program. These action figures are usually marketed towards boys and male collectors...
s as stop-motion puppets in conjunction) and Moral Orel
Moral Orel
Moral Orel is an American stop-motion animated television show, which originally aired on Adult Swim from December 13, 2005 to December 18, 2008...
. Many independent young filmmakers have used clay animation features for internet viewing.
Flushed Away
Flushed Away
Flushed Away is a 2006 computer animated British film directed by David Bowers and Sam Fell. It is a partnership between Aardman Animations of Wallace and Gromit fame, and DreamWorks Animation, and is Aardman's first completely computer-animated feature as opposed to the usual stop-motion.The film...
is a CGI
Computer-generated imagery
Computer-generated imagery is the application of the field of computer graphics or, more specifically, 3D computer graphics to special effects in art, video games, films, television programs, commercials, simulators and simulation generally, and printed media...
replication of clay animation.
Probably the most spectacular use of model animation for a computer game was for the Virgin Interactive Entertainment Mythos
Mythos Games
Mythos Games is a defunct British video game developer company founded by Julian Gollop.-Games developed by Mythos Games:* Rebelstar II * Laser Squad * Lords of Chaos * Magic & Mayhem -External links:*...
game Magic and Mayhem
Magic and Mayhem
Magic & Mayhem, also known as Duel: The Mage Wars , The Art of Magic , Mana: Der Weg der schwarzen Macht , Duelo de hechiceros , Art of Magic: La Guerra dei Maghi and Arcanes , is a fantasy/mythology-themed real-time strategy game designed by Julian Gollop and developed by Mythos Games...
(1998), for which stop-motion animator and special-effects expert Alan Friswell constructed over 25 monsters and mythological characters utilising both modelling clay and latex rubber, over wire and ball-and-socket skeletons. Rather than building the models in the cartoon-like style of Wallace and Gromit
Wallace and Gromit
Wallace and Gromit are the main characters in a series consisting of four British animated short films and a feature-length film by Nick Park of Aardman Animations...
, Friswell constructed the figures after the designs of Willis O'Brien
Willis O'Brien
Willis Harold O'Brien was an Irish American pioneering motion picture special effects artist who perfected and specialized in stop-motion animation. He was affectionately known to his family and close friends as "Obie"....
and Ray Harryhausen
Ray Harryhausen
Ray Harryhausen is an American film producer and special effects creator...
to make them more compatible with the game's often violent playing tactics.
Claymation
The term Claymation is a registered trademark in the United StatesUnited States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, registered by Will Vinton
Will Vinton
Will Vinton is an American director and producer of animated films. He was born in McMinnville, Oregon, near Portland. He has won an Oscar for his work, and several Emmy Awards and Clio Awards for the work of his studio.- Education :...
in 1978 to describe his clay-animated films. While the word is not considered a genericized trademark
Genericized trademark
A genericized trademark is a trademark or brand name that has become the colloquial or generic description for, or synonymous with, a general class of product or service, rather than as an indicator of source or affiliation as intended by the trademark's holder...
, it has become a trademark that is often used generically in the U.S. and is also a term used in the UK to refer to any animation using Plasticine
Plasticine
Plasticine, a brand of modelling clay, is a putty-like modelling material made from calcium salts, petroleum jelly and aliphatic acids. The name is a registered trademark of Flair Leisure Products plc...
or similar substance.