Yesterday was a huge day. HUGE. I took that leap into fabricating my own armatures. It's been something that I've wanted to try for a long time, so last weekend I took a trip to the hardware store and hobby shop for supplies. The rest of the week, I spent my free time reviewing the 'how to' stuff on www.stopmotionworks.com, and getting advice from a few people that have made their own armatures. Thanks Lionel and Jeremy. When Friday rolled around, I headed over to Buddy System Studios, where they let me work and use some select power tools. I also wanted to say thanks to Ethan Marak for leaving his pre-drilled vice for holding ball bearings at the shop. Thanks Ethan.
I'm using brass because it's seems like a good starting metal to work with.
After getting everything set up, I filed, center-punched, and drilled the balls. Lesson learned... from now on, buy pre-tapped balls. This will save time AND make sure every hole is drilled straight. To see how not to do it, just look at the photos. Ha!
Once I tapped the balls, I soldered them onto round stock. I have to admit that this step is what intimidated me the most, but once I tried it, it was super fun. And a lot less stressful than I built it up to be. For soldering, I used a mini butane torch. It's basically a giant lighter. Next was the brass plates. I measured, etched and drilled the plates, tapped screw holes, and counter sunk ball holes. I took about 15 minutes to grind and polish the plates, and then assembled the completed joints.
When everything was completed, it all worked pretty well, but definitely not perfect. I'm also experimenting with various screw types for tensioning. For these joints, I counter-sinked the screw hole. I'm probably going to avoid this in the future to save time on work as well as keeping as much of the metal there for me to ratchet down on. From my character design, you can see that Karl is a bit plump, so I'm working on adding grip points for animating. Keep in touch for updates. Till then, enjoy.
4 comments:
Congratulations for taming that dragon!
Congrats man!
Monster step into a new World.
so exciting!!!
jriggity
fwiw, I've got a page that collects my own armature tutorials in one place: http://scarletstarstudios.com/stopmo/
Looking good so far -- good luck!
john, good to see you taking the plunge. people resist, but it really is not that hard to get the hang of. i was kind of busy last time you wrote, but feel free to continue prodding me if you get stuck.
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