The LEGO Movie Maker app has been around for just about three years now. It a very popular and user-friendly app to create LEGO stop-motion animations. The simple tools and guides of the app make it easy to shoot, edit, and even score your movie with music. The LEGO Movie Maker works on iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad devices with camera and supports operating systems of iOS5 and up. The app is free, and you can download it at iTunes. Here is the link: DOWNLOAD LEGO MOVIE MAKER APP 🙂
We have talked about LEGO Movie Maker previously when it was first released, so I won’t repeat the details of the app here, however I recently found a series of video-tutorials for the app directly by LEGO, that are not just useful for those who are using this particular application, but for all LEGO stop-motion animators. There are five tutorials in the series and they cover various tips and tricks to improve your animation. In the video-player below you can watch all of five tutorials:
➡ LEGO Movie Maker App – Storyboard & Editing Tips and Tricks: This video shows you how to best plan and edit your movies. First you learn about drawing a simple storyboard to keep track of the action-scenes of your movie. You can either upload the storyboard images to your device, or just follow them along on paper, and mark them complete when you are done filming each scene. The second part of this video focuses on editing your uploaded scenes and adding sound-effects.
➡ LEGO Movie Maker App – Lighting Tips and Tricks: This video shows you how to use lighting in your brick films to create lots of cool effects. The first part of the video covers setting up basic lighting for your movie-scene with lamps, and adding special effects with flashlights. The second part of the video addresses more advanced lighting techniques using transparent LEGO pieces to change the color of the lights, and even create a realistic sunset.
➡ LEGO Movie Maker App – Building Tips and Tricks: This video shows you how to build better settings for your videos by making pre-made wall-sections, furniture pieces and other props. The tutorial also covers how to use forced-perspective techniques by making miniature buildings to fill up the skyline.
➡ LEGO Movie Maker App – Camera Tips and Tricks: This video will show you ways to use your camera for different video effects in your brickfilm. Important aspects are covered like framing your scenes, and when to use wide-shots and when to use close-ups. There is even a brilliant trick of using a LEGO magnifying glass to get really close shots with your camera. The second part of the tutorial goes in detail about moving your camera frame by frame. It also covers camera-movement like zooming, panning, and using a shaky camera for creating a dramatic effect. The end of the tutorial covers creating tracking-shots for car chase and other similar scenes.
➡ LEGO Movie Maker App – Animation Tips and Tricks: This video will show you how to improve the animation of your brickfilms. Advanced stop-motion filming concepts are covered like ease-in and ease-out, walking and running, making your LEGO minifigs fly. Also the tutorial talks about brick-effects, including changing the facial expression of minifigs, water effects, laser-gun effects, and even window breaking effect.
As you can see, you can create some pretty advanced LEGO brickfilms just by using these short tutorials. Even if you are using some other animation software instead of the LEGO Movie Maker app the tutorials can be very valuable to get your started with creating LEGO stop-motion films. What do you think? Did you find these tutorials helpful? Have you made a brickfilm before? What was your experience? Feel free to share and discuss in the comment section below! 😉
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