Boinx's iStopMotion for iPad Review

Before I jump into the review i'm going to say that Boinx is not paying me to do this review and the following is my personal opinion only. With that being said let's get to it shall we?

Before we get into it I would like to show you some clay test animation that I made with iStopMotion...

Untitled from SMG on Vimeo.

The first thing that shows up when you open iStopMotion is a quick Stop Motion video which runs you through the key features of the app for instance: the capture button, playback, and adjusting your camera settings. Let me say that this video is of the poorest quality of animation, it's just terrible. But, if you stop to think about it, there is a good explanation for this; my guess is that Boink doesn't want beginners to look at animation that is the equivalent of Coraline and comparing their own work to it.

This app itself is very straightforward. Directly below the welcome video is a plus button which if you tap creates a new project.

one of my favorite features about iStopMotion is the ability to adjust you iPads camera settings. To get to this you tap the ------------ button in the upper right corner which gives you the cameras at your disposal: front camera, back camera, and remote camera (which i'll get to later). If you tap the settings tab next to your choice of camera you have the ability to adjust your white balance, exposure, and focus. Once you have adjusted your settings to your liking your ready to film.

On the right hand side you have your capture button. And on the left hand side of your screen you have your playback button. Below these buttons is the handy-dandy frame scrubber, which you can view each frame and delete it or replace it.

Next to the frame scrubber is the playback settings button which lets you turn on and off onion skin, and adjust your frame rate (fps). There is a default 12 fps, which is usually the compromise between good animation and the time you spend animating.

The only downside of an app form is the easiness for possibility of camera shakiness. The more shaky the final film is, the more amateurish your film looks. But now, thanks to Boinx there is a simple, yet efficitive fix. This answer comes in a remote app from which you can control your camera settings over you wi-fi network. This alone takes a load off mind so I can now just concentrate on animation.

Exporting is also very simple. Click the share button below your project in the gallery and from there you can export it to camera roll, YouTube, and many other options.

Rating:

Buy it here: http://boinx.com/ or on the app store.

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