VIDBOX Stopmotion Studio 4.0

Very easy to use good software for a beginner.

In short, though Stopmotion Studio 4.0 has a lot of nice features, it is far from intuitive.Honestech markets this as being great for students and education, but I found it challenging to just dive right in and make an animation. The cover of the box makes it look like this software is aimed at kids, but I think some kids will end up frustrated by the process if they don't get a little help.My 14-year-old son and I sat down to make a stop-motion video: roughly 30 pictures of a Lego construction, taken on a digital camera. (A little background here: my son has no problem making stop-motion animations using his iPod Touch and an app.) Once finished, we transferred the pictures to my PC, and started up Stopmotion Studio. The goal? Import those 30 pictures, make an animation from them, and export it as a video. This seemed like a simple idea, and we eventually figured it out, but we had to refer to the manual several times in the process. Here are the questions we had:* What are you supposed to click to import the photos?* How do we speed up or slow down the animation?* What is the difference between exporting as an MPEG or MPEG 2 video?* Why is the resolution bad? Is it something we should take care of when we start the project or something we take care of when we export the movie?Now, I'm not against reading manuals. However, if you are getting this software for a child, let me suggest that you might want to practice the process once or twice with that child.With so many well made and intuitive mobile apps for creating animations, it is hard to recommend this software if you are looking for something simple. Yes, Stopmotion Studio has a lot of great features, and the price is decent. But it is wrong to suggest that this is aimed at children.

My 12 year old son has already made Lego stop animations with it. He also made an animation for his upcoming Oddessy of the Mind competition. There are no controls over sound and it's really easy to lay in sound tracks or load sound files, but I'd suggest recording outside the program for full control in something like Audacity... then loading in your sound files. I'm planning on using it with one of my pro Nikons to do some intervelometer photography... watching a flower open, ice shapes melt... time lapse is easy with this software. We paired it with a manual focusing, Pro HD Webcam 1080P Widescreen camera from Stopmotion Explosion.

Worked fairly good-Easy to understand-Limited functionality

Company doesn't seem to exist any more, so we are left with a persistent nag to register the product which we are then kept from doing because the registration process can't be completed through the internet, and choosing the PDF option doesn't turn off the Nag.Instructions are minimal, too.That said, it is probably the best product you can get for the money, with all sorts of useful features and easy enough for a nine-year-old to use (with some adult guidance in lieu of the written instructions).

I actually ordered this product to help liven up my presentations at work. Instead of just boring PowerPoint slides I thought I’d show a sequence of events with stop motion movies. (Need to keep my audience awake). The movies were a hit at work, but what really amazed me was how much the kids at home enjoyed making the movies too. The tweens actually abandoned their phones and video games and tried something that didn’t exercise just their thumbs.Installation of the software was quick and easy,… Although there was a bit of confusion with the Quicktime module. Apparently the Honestech install tried to install an “older” version of Quicktime onto my PC. I already had a newer version of Quicktime, and this conflict caused a really weird error message popped up. But I just canceled the error/warning message and the installation continued on its merry way.After installation, the software immediately recognized my webcam. The software turned on my webcam, and displayed an image of my startled face on the screen. Whooa… should have brushed my hair. I quickly plugged in my Nikon DSLR and flipped the input from webcam to camera. With the camera in Liveview I just pressed the capture icon in the software, and the software (controlling my camera) snapped a picture. My first movie was just my stapler “walking” across my desk, but it was I very impressed with the simple yet functional features packed into the software. The on-screen grid lines help you lineup your objects and insure their motion is not jerky. The “onion skin” feature shows a transparent version of the previous image so you can see how much you have moved your object. I used the Chroma key feature so I could change the background and place my walking stapler on the Mars. I was quickly able to add a Space Odyssey soundtrack, and a basic title and credit screen. Note: The text editor doesn’t do anything fancy, but it is fine for quick mockups. If you want something really flashy you would have to create the screen in another package and import it in as an image.After my first pass, I added some frames that showed my stapler being lowered onto the Mars’ landscape. I had to attach a string to the stapler to take the pictures, but I used the String Removal feature to erase the string from my image captures. Using the StoryBoard I was able to rearrange my images and put the new “stapler drop” images at the front of the pack. A few minutes later I exported my first stop motion film: “Stapler on Mars”.After my training session I called my 12-year old niece over and we made a movie using her One-Direction dolls (she is crazy about Niall). We setup the five dolls up so they were performing on-stage. Next we put images of my niece and her and her friends as the background so it looked that they were attending a concert, and then we added the soundtrack. She loved it, and I loved that she loved it. Great bonding experience. Now I'm her favorite aunt.So if you want to give stop motion animation a try this Honestech Stopmotion Studio is a great place to start. It is easy enough for the kids to use on their own, but with a little help from you the kiddos can create some impressive videos to amaze and impress their friends.