Hello! Thanks so much for enrolling your kiddo for some fish bowl fun! There will be an in depth hands on tutorial, and some crafting that we will do together! There are a few things that you can do to help your child get the most out of this adventure! To create our animations we are going to be using the app, “Stop motion Studio.” It is really simple, and the kids will be able to shoot and edit all in one place. You may have already downloaded it for stop motion. 

All of the features we will be using to create a successful animation are available in the free version of the app! I will be showing a fun bit of information on a way to digitally add bubbles to our video! This will use the “paint” feature in the app and is 99 cents if you want to add it on, or is part of the full version of the app. Now, you don’t have to digitally add in bubbles, we can also add them in practically, and I am going to show how to do both methods! 

If you could download the app on the device you want your child to be using to film their videos, that would be really helpful! Also, I have included a some printable PDF files. You can find them in the course material. If this video isn’t on full screen, then you may see them on the left side of this video!

There are a few versions of the printable. Some pages have already been colored. If you want to speed up the process of making this video, you can start with those! If your kids want to get a bit more creative, feel free to download the coloring page version of all the under the sea elements! Your kiddo can color the elements how ever they want! We will also be cutting out the elements in the printables, so if you need to help with the cutting, or supervise the use of scissors, your help is appreciated. I know that some of you may be doing this activity at home with kids of different ages. I have also included a coloring page for little ones to be involved who many not be old enough to animate just yet! Feel free to print that out as well, so they can take part in all the fun!

Now, lets chat a bit about equipment! You don’t need to purchase a tripod to take part of this adventure. But, if you wanted to make things a bit easier for your child, please help them find a way to stabilize their device. You could do this with an inexpensive tripod. Or, you could get crafty and make a stand of your own invention! I have seen a lot of parents come up with really inventive ways to hold up the device! You could use a clothing hanger, chair, or a stack of books, a cardboard box, or maybe even a ladder you have in the garage! Just something to help stabilize the camera. 

The last thing that would be so helpful is a trigger for your child to remotely click the camera shutter. You could get a fancy blue tooth one if you wanted, but if you have a pair of volume controlling headphones, that volume button will act as a remote shutter! Thank you so much for supporting your little animator, I am excited have some fun with our new fish pet! 

Here are some of the things we use in this mini camp.

1. This is a link to the app we use. https://apps.apple.com/us/app/stop-motion-studio/id441651297

Below are Amazon links to some of the less common supplies we use in the minicamp. We will also place the link for these supplies in the specific videos that they are highlighted in. In the specific videos we present more common alternatives that can be found at home but if you want to make it a little easier we have found the products on amazon for you!