Page 44 - Senior Link Magazine Summer 2023 - Online Magazine

Animation-Making

Workshops at Texas Tech:

Helping the Lubbock Community

laptops equipped with webcams or any other external cameras.
The only requirement is that the animators can easily move the
camera to a position that allows them to capture consistent and
clear images.
The AMW has worked with 5th graders attending an at-risk
school, the Center for Collegiate Recovery Communities at
TTU, the Parkway Guadalupe Center Summer camp, and
youth in the autism spectrum; they are ready to work with any
ince 2019, Drs. Jorgelina Orfila (Art History, School of senior community that would like to take advantage of the
Art, TTU) and Francisco Ortega (Graphic Design and workshops. They are free, and the materials and equipment are
SAnimation, School of Art, TTU) have collaborated in an provided by the AMW team.
interdisciplinary research and teaching project that explores
the history and theory of animation. The practical component For more information contact:
of their project is the Animation-Making Workshops (AMW),
a research undertaking that seeks to establish the effectiveness Francisco.ortega@ttu.edu
of the animation-making process as a transformational agent
in therapeutic, educational, and social contexts, by developing AMW: http://animationmaking.org/
a method that is based on the inherent characteristics of The AMW is supported in part by the Talkington College
animation. The researchers design and direct the workshops of Visual & Performing Arts through the NEARL (National
in partnership with scholars and practitioners specialized in Endowment for the Arts Research Lab) Federal grant.
the study and service of specific populations. The workshops
consist of twelve weekly sessions where Drs. Orfila and
Ortega help participants to create a one-minute stop-
motion animation.
Stop motion is an umbrella term that describes a
wide range of animation techniques in which objects
are physically manipulated in small increments and
photographed so that they seem to have independent
movement when the sequence of images is played back.
Stop-motion animation encompasses, among other
materials and techniques, sand, painting, cutouts, collage,
photographs, folded paper, brick-films, and claymation.
Virtually anything and everything can be animated with
this technique.
Stop-motion animation associates the physical process
of the tactile experience of working with materials and
the development of motor skills and body awareness
with the creative use of accessible technology. That is, it
combines the advantages of working with the hands and
the body in the creation and manipulation of objects with
user-friendly digital technology. Creating a stop-motion
animation is not only fun but also helps improve kinetic
and observation skills, movement coordination, and
memory, as the process stimulates different parts of the
brain.

The workshops can take place at the School of Art’s lab or
wherever the groups meet as the AMW team has created
portable and highly adaptable sets of animation stations
that they take to the site. These workstations demonstrate
that creating a stop-motion animation does not
require sophisticated equipment and can be done with
commonly used devices, such as smart phones, tablets, or

44 Lubbock Senior Link