The Making Of...

the Narnia Lamppost Animation

the wind whispers around the Narnia Lamppost

Click here for the animation of Narnia in Winter. File is 2MB requires Flash plugin.

The recent Winter was brilliant for taking pictures. Lots of sun and lots of snow. I decided to make an animated photograph of the Narnia Lamp post. Here's how I did it, using Adobe Photoshop CS and ImageReady CS.

Step 1 - Taking a Picture: Tripod and Exposure
First of all, I used a tripod to mount the camera. Then I forgot to lock exposure (after all these years I'm still not used to digital camera's) which caused a lot of extra work in Photoshop to get the different exposures more or less the same. I'm writing this just to remind you in case you're wanting to do the same kind of thing: make sure you lock exposure.

Without altering the zoom, I then made a number of pictures at a time when there was snow and some wind. The snow you will see on the animation is actual snow (not the fake internet postcard kind of snow!) and the wind is causing the branches to sway back and forth. The movement of the branches are what makes this picture special.

Step 2 - Copying Pictures to Layers into 1 File
I had ended up with five pictures I could use. These I opened in Photoshop, and I copied numbers 2, 3, 4, and 5 as layers into number 1 (select the entire picture #2, choose copy, activate #1 and choose paste. This adds picture #2 as new layer in picture #1). Then I fiddled around to get a more or less even movement of the branches (I had to reverse #2 and #3 in the stacking order and I had to make slight adjustments to position the lamp post each time precisely over the previous layer: the wind had rocked the camera a little after all).

Step 3 - Adding Frames & Allocating Layers
With the five pictures adjusted and in the right stacking order on the layers, I switched to ImageReady and selected Window -> Animation. A window appeared representing a series of animation frames, with Frame #1 already there. Now I turned off all layers except layer #1. Then I duplicated the first frame, selected the resulting Frame #2, turned off layer #1 and turned on layer #2. For frame duration I set 0.1 second. Now I hit the play button and I was excited to see where this was going.

Step 4 - Tweening
After having made 3 more frames and allocating the visibility of the different layers to the individual frames, I had a total of 5 frames, each with one layer visible and each frame set to 0.1 second. Then I selected the first frame, and clicked the button for Tweening. From the dialog box I choose these options: Frames to Add: 1; Parameters: Opacity; Layers: All and Tween With: Next Frame. What tweening does, is adding a number of frames between the active frame and the one selected with "Tween With:." In this scenario, I opted for one extra frame between Frame #1 and Frame #2 with a graduation in opacity. Layer #1 in Frame #1 has the standard 100% opacity, Layer #2 in Frame #2 ditto, while the new frame in between (hence the name of the command) has been set (automatically) to 50% opacity of Layer #1 and 50% For Layer #2.

Step 4 - Fine Tuning Tweening
The opacity now needs to be adjusted. Select the newly added Frame (which is now called #2) and notice the eye in the checkbox at Layer #1 and in the checkbox at Layer #2. Select Layer #2 and drag the opacity-slider from 50% to 100%. Without doing so, the effect would be a transition from Layer #1 through a combination of 50% visibility Layer #1 and 50 % visibility Layer #2 with 50% checkerboard pattern (or whatever background is set) to Layer #2. This is not the desired effect, hence the reason for adjusting the target layer to 100%. Repeat these steps for the other frames. Note: when you get to the last frame, change the setting to tween with the first frame and rather than setting the target layer (Layer #1) to 50% opacity, this time set the originating layer (Layer #5) to 50% opacity (in the stacking order, Layer #5 is below Layer #1; adjusting opacity of a lower layer has no visible impact on a layer higher up).

Step 5 - Flash
Finally, choose Export -> Macromedia Flash. That's it. Sit back and enjoy the show.

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