How to Make Stop-Motion Videos: Your Kids’ Toys Come to Life!

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Unleash Their Creativity: Make Stop-Motion Videos With Your Phone

Being stuck at home due to COVID-19 has given us the opportunity to try some new things. One activity that my kids are loving is making stop-motion videos with my phone.

I’ve always wanted to try this and now we have lots of extra time for creative projects!

What is Stop-Motion Video?

Stop motion is a type of animation where objects are moved in small increments and photographed. Then, all the photographs are played back as a seamless video and the objects appear to be moving on their own.

If you’ve seen the claymation video series Shaun the Sheep or Wallace and Gromit then you’ve seen stop-motion video.

Our First Attempt At Stop Motion With Toys

I’m not a video expert, but making stop-motion videos was actually very easy with the Lapse It app and a YouTube tutorial.

Below are the two stop-motion videos we made on our first attempt. My 10-year-old son loved making his Hot Wheels cars crash. Also, my 8-year-old daughter delighted in making her Calico Critters figures come to life.

Hot Wheels Crash

Calico Critters Come to Life

Calico Critters are my daughter’s absolute favorite toys right now. They remind me of Beatrix Potter’s personified animal characters, with their quaint clothing.

*Update: Here’s Another One After Lots of Practice

How to Make Stop-Motion Videos

Best Stop-Motion Video App: Lapse It

After reading many reviews, I decided to go with the Lapse It app and I’ve been very happy with it. It’s very easy to use but has a lot of fun features.

The Lapse It app does time-lapse and stop-motion video. Basically, it just helps you take pictures as you move the objects around and then seamlessly stitches all the photos together into a video.

With the Lapse It app, you can set it to automatically snap pictures at regular intervals so you don’t have to keep touching the phone.

You can also use this app to slow down or speed up the motion of the video during the editing process.

There is a free and a paid version of this app. I went with the paid version because it seemed to have more features and it was only a few dollars.

YouTube Tutorial We Used to Learn How to Do Stop-Motion Video

There are lots of helpful YouTube tutorials about stop motion, but this was the one that we found the most informative:

How to Make a Stop Motion Video From Your Phone

Tips For Making Stop-Motion Videos

Here are some things that helped us make our first two videos:

-If you don’t have a tripod for your phone, put it in a mug with a sock in the bottom to prop it up or lay it on top of a stack of books with the camera hanging off the edge (check out the YouTube video I posted above to see how to do this).

-Make sure your lighting is good. Our lighting was far from professional, but I was able to tweak it on my phone’s video editor.

-Move the objects just a little bit for each shot.

-Make sure the camera does not move.

-Use poster board as a backdrop.

-Decide ahead of time what will happen in your video.

-Start with two or three objects to move at the most.

The Two Most Important Technical Settings In the App

There are 2 settings in the app that you need to understand: the interval timer and the sequence duration.

Interval Timer

The interval timer is a setting that makes your phone camera take a picture automatically without you having to push the button (and possibly move the camera).

There’s a countdown graphic on the app so you can see when the next photo will be taken in order to get your hands out of the frame in time. However, if your hands happen to be in any shots, it’s no big deal. You can go back and delete those later.

I found 15 seconds to be the perfect setting. It’s a good amount of time to move the objects and get your hands out of the way in time for the next shot.

If you set the interval timer to 15 seconds, it will take a picture automatically every 15 seconds.

Sequence Duration

The second important setting in the app is the sequence duration.

The sequence duration is something you adjust after you’re done taking pictures. It’s simply how long the video is, which determines how fast the objects move.

If objects are moving too fast, simply make the sequence duration longer.

You just have to play around with it to find the right speed. Our first attempt with the cars video was so fast, we could barely see them. When we increased the sequence duration from 1 second to 3 seconds, it was perfect.

Finishing It Up

In the editor tab, you can add various effects and audio. You can also select and delete individual photos that have mistakes (like your hand).

Once you have your video the way you like it, you simply hit the export button in the app. Then it gives you the option to save it to your photos.

That’s it! It’s very simple! Then you can share it like you would any other video.

I hope you’ll try this fun project with your kids. It makes their toys come to life right before their eyes.

*Feel free to comment below if you have any questions!