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Creating a hybrid 2d and 3d animation
Animation has fascinated humanity for more time anyone can remember; ever since the first flipbook showed people how images could be made to move, the race has always been on to make animation better and more expressive. It has always been two-dimensional animation though until very recently, when 3D animation performed on computers, began to supplant 2D. But does the arrival of 3D animation have to necessarily mean the end of 2D? How might one go about using two at the same time? With the right software and knowledge, it is possible to tastefully put 2D and 3D together in the same scenes and films. Begin by putting down on paper, drawings of how you wish to have your hybrid scene appear. You will need to plan the 3D elements of your film, the background, and plan them down to every detail of their appearance. You could also do well to write down details of all the 3-D components of the scene that will need to actually be animated. Creating an environment on 3-D software can take a great deal of time; modeling a tree, a rock and other component, placing them exactly where you want to see them, can end up taking days. You can find excellent tools for this in any 3D animation software, and also in Photoshop . Always remember that it is not your aim to just create smooth surfaces all over: all good 3-D animation software provides for texture programming. All the 3-D objects in your film that need to be animated, can be run through a 3-D rendering application. Take your camera angle exactly as you wish to see it in your film, and try not to keep the camera static. It is the motion that will allow you to show your audience the difference between the 2D elements of your film and the 3D ones. Rendering is the process by which a programmed graphic is actually made visible by translating the mathematical formulae used by the software into actually visible pictures. Your animation program can be used at this point to take up all the characters and backgrounds you created and to animate them. The rendering process achieves this. In the rendering process, each frame programmed is interpreted from computer models to visible pictures. When you open the 3D backgrounds you created in your animation program you can begin to paint in the 2D characters you have created with the help of the animating software, or by other means. If you have any camera angle changes or panning planned, you must keep track of how the background environment needs the change to the appropriate new background in each frame. You can do this on the frame by frame basis until your 2D character easily moves against a moving background.

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Stop motion animation as a creative hobby
It can be a particularly creative hobby to take up, to look towards stop motion animation. This kind of creativity is just right for the passionate artist of modest means. The only equipment you need to start out with are an inexpensive digital camera, a computer and software for under $100. The great thing about being creative on a budget is that the main contribution to the final product comes from not great equipment or anything, but from your own imagination and creativity: you need to think in unconventional ways to achieve the results you want. Picking two-dimensional stop motion animation to start with simplifies things and allows you many possibilities to work with. You can start preparing for your story by making drawings on paper, and erasing and drawing over, for the various stages in motion you wish to depict. If tracing over the same drawing over again seems like too much work, you can just do it on different sheets of paper and photograph each one. This can give a cleaner look, but it can be very difficult to ensure that the images are properly tracked without moving about: this could result in a jerky motion in the end. A better way to go about it might be the use of some sort of a surface that is easily erased for repeat use. A chalkboard or a white board could be good possibilities. All you have to do to make your character move is to erase the part of the character’s body that needs to move and draw over that, leaving the rest untouched. There are very expressive animation possibilities using cut-and-paste paper figures. The drawing you make can be cut at the joints, and moved easily to depict motion. You could make several drawings of the same object to show motion. If you have to animate the face, you could draw several standard expressions on different sheets and switch between them to bring out the appearance of speech. Three-dimensional animation opens up to you possibilities that are even greater. Use of plasticine or clay could make great 3D models, and malleable wire to fashion stick figures out of can be a good starting point. Wire can be the material of choice to work with; plasticine is often molded over wire figures for use as a skeleton too. If you have little action figures, these often have movable flexible limbs and bodies that can be used to articulate motion. There should be a degree of viewer motion in the final movie experience. This is achieved by using the camera in creative ways to animate the picture: you can pan and move the camera from side to side. Remember, your movie is called an animation not a static. As always, it is the thought behind the part that counts and not the technique itself. A sensitive story and artistic storytelling will always make any stop motion animation movie stand out.

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