Skip to main content

Ray Harryhausen's Armacreature Armatures Sell Fast for Animation Tool Kit

The owner of the successful Animation Tool Kit Westly Wood, has found recent success in selling his Ray Harryhausen endorsed Armacreature armatures.

Their product, an armature set of 20 engineered stainless steel joints, hardened stainless steel balls and socket head screws, a foot and toe tie down, and T section boss system; which, is a much more advanced system than Ray had when starting out.  In interviews he talked about walking down to the local Pep Boys to buy ball and socket mirrors, which he would then saw off the mirror mechanism so he could then use the joint.  Below is a reprint article from Animation Magazine...

 The endorsement by Harryhausen, who created stop-motion effects for decades for films such as Jason and the Argonauts and Clash of the Titans, was key for Wood, whose company has provided armature kits for as many as 5,000 animation projects across the world. Harryhausen died last year at the age of 92.
As an expert in stop motion animation, Westley, who lives in Altrincham and is currently producing and directing programs such as Compost Corner and Stix and Stones for CITV out of MediaCityUK, identified a gap in the market to provide kits which when built provide the skeleton for animation characters. After they have been fleshed out with clay and various other materials, the armatures are then brought to life by animators who move them frame by frame to create stop motion animation.
“The idea to create animation armature kits was really born by seeing trainee animation students struggle to build puppets for their films, it’s very time consuming as well as difficult to find the parts to build a quality and durable armature for a character. In my spare time I started to make the kits in my garage and demand soon picked up,” says Wood. “Harryhausen is the grand master of stop motion animation so I knew that if he agreed to endorse my product that my armature kits would really take off. I felt very honoured that he gave my product his seal of approval before he sadly passed away.”
To cope with demand, three factories in China now produce the thousands of parts that were sold this year alone and sales have increased 10 fold since Harryhausen endorsed the product. Customers now extend beyond the student market to industry professionals across the world as well as avid model makers and film enthusiasts."
Ray Harryhausen's Armacreature

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

CGI/ Stop Motion "The Little Prince" Trailer is Here

Mark Osborne's ( Kung Fu Panda ) has released the first trailer for his next movie The Little Prince.  The trailer is spectacular.  The film is a mix of 2D hand drawn, paper cut-out Stop Motion, puppet Stop Motion, and CGI.  Which is pretty risky in this day and age.  Now, anything with 2D or Stop Motion is an immediate red-flag; needless to say, this film (the Stop Motion side of it) will be beautiful.  Although in the trailer we see a CGI little girl imagine a hand drawn plane, which turns into a paper cut-out plane, and then morphs into a Stop Motion puppet that becomes The Little Prince.  CGI, in my opinion, was not the way to go with this project -- or so I thought.  Now that I see the fusion process in realtime my view has shifted a little.  Although my rule still stands, if you don't have a huge budget for CGI then don't do it !  The Little Prince trailer, though, did still pull it off; yes, it could be tweaked, but I have confidence ...
Post a Comment
Read full article »

Vincent & Puppet Scales

Tim Burton's Vincent  is a masterpiece; the short was animated by the brilliant Stephen Chiodo .  I do love that the short was shot in black and white film, ask any true film-lover and
Post a Comment
Read full article »

Phil Tippett Launches "Mad God (Part 2)" Kickstarter

In 2012, Phil Tippett ( Empire Strikes Back , Indiana Jones , and is ILM veteran), along side of a small group of dedicated volunteers Kickstartered, storyboarded, shot, and edited, his passion project  Mad God .  Now, comes the 2 part in this four part epic.  In the Kickstarter video for Mad God Part 2 , Phil announces that there will be four parts in this epic.  I find it very funny the way he puts this though, "I got four parts.  Four parts, and I know what I'm doing!  I'm not making it up as I go along, (laughs), honestly! His goal for the sequel is to raise $60,000.  Though there is a number of stretch goals he has incorporated, for instance, if Mad God Part 2 raise $70,000, all backers receive a 'family photo' of Phil and his crew.  Today is day 29 of the total 30 day campaign, and they have raised $1,500 so far.  I recommend supporting this project.  If you haven't yet watched the first part of Mad God , you can do so by g...
Post a Comment
Read full article »

Best Book for Stop Motion Enthusiasts?

So help me, I can not figure out why I'm not putting this post in the FAQs page.  Still, here it goes. A question that I probably get asked the most is: "I don't have a ton of money to put to Stop Motion, but I need to know exactly what to do.  Is there a good website or book that can help me?" Dear (Joe, maybe) [Stop Motion enthusiast], The book you should look into getting is
Post a Comment
Read full article »

A Trip to the Moon!!

Today, on Stopmotion geek we are going old school, and I really mean old school.  Why this is so old is that were discovering, well, your discovering, I'm giving you info that I already know, so, you know, not really discovering... so what, I can rediscover, mmmhun!  Georges Melies, was the first-ever Stop Motion animator, in fact, he invented Stop Motion; therefore, we'll
Post a Comment
Read full article »

Interview with Samuel Lewis - Animator, Character Designer, and Sculptor on Stop Motion Short Film, "Lost & Found"

Knotjira, a clumsy dinosaur made of wool, as seen in Lost & Found . Photo courtesy of Andrew Goldsmith. “If I had to pick a starting point for my career as a stop motion animator I would have to say it was my obsession as a six year old with a book called ‘Playing with Plasticine’ by Barbara Reid,” Samuel Lewis – a London-based stop motion and 2D animator and director, whose most recent labor of love can be seen in his contribution to the Australian stop motion short film, Lost & Found – tells Stop Motion Geek. Upon reflection, Lewis explains that his love for the medium of stop motion began very early in life, and has merely managed to burn ever brighter in his fervor to master the craft. “I would spend countless hours fixated on sculpting tiny snails, fruit bowls and dinosaurs to the point where I would stay inside on family holidays sculpting a surfer in a beach scene rather than going to the actual beach that was only a short walk away,” Lewis recalls wistfully. “...
Post a Comment
Read full article »

Short Flicks: Bent Image Lab's "Fruity Pebbles"

What could be better than starting your day off with part of a whole breakfast, Fred Flintstone, and Stop Motion?  We couldn't think of anything either.  Nevertheless, these awesome commercials/BTS will bring out the kid, and nerd, in all of us.  Directed by Rob Shaw for the incredible Bent Image Lab (a studio that just moved to Manhattan , by the way), these TV spots encapsulates everything we know and love about the modern stone-age Flintstone family who establish how we now think of Prehistoric times. Fire House :  http://vimeo.com/45991027 Cocoa Pebbles "Fire Hose" from Bent Image Lab on Vimeo . Cop Rock :  http://vimeo.com/42010097 Cocoa Pebbles "Cop Rock" from Bent Image Lab on Vimeo .
Post a Comment
Read full article »

Interview with Mark Smith, Director and Writer of Stop Motion Short Film, "Two Balloons"

A still from Two Balloons featuring the character of Elba. Photo courtesy of Mark Smith. As I sit, listening to Peter Broderick’s moving composition for piano  More Of A Composition , I close my eyes and envisage an enormous funnel cloud skimming across the crystalline face of an ocean – the skies are murky and unusually dark, lightning crackles, spider-webbing across the darkened skies before then vanishing, and still, after its gone, an electricity continues to hum in the air and I simply  know  that it’s going to soon strike again. And as the scene presents itself to me, I suddenly feel something similar to what director Mark C. Smith felt when he saw the same image as he sailed to a small island called Grenada along with his wife in a timeworn sailboat. For him, in that moment inspiration struck, and the idea suddenly came to him for his heartfelt stop motion film,  Two Balloons . For me, I open my eyes and feel as I did the instant  Two Balloons  ...
Post a Comment
Read full article »

Interview with Lucy J. Hayes, Producer of Stop Motion Love Story, "Lost & Found"

Knitsune in Lost & Found . Photo courtesy of Andrew Goldsmith. Ever since her childhood, Lucy J. Hayes – the producer of Lost & Found , an extraordinarily beautiful short film that make for a profound mediation on the impermanence and imperfection of life and beauty – she’s wanted to play some part in the creative industry, in some way, shape, or form. For Hayes, that dream went unquestioned. However, the challenge turned out to be figuring out quite where she belonged in the creative industry. “I dabbled in acting and directing, however, I was terrible!” Hayes tells Stop Motion Geek. It wasn’t until she began to put on plays with her friends in her adolescence and early adulthood that the answer to her search dawned upon her: All that Hayes found came innately to her – everything from her ardor for creative work to her love for working with creatives to bring an idea, the kernel of a story, to fruition – she found in the title of “producer.” Knotjira (left) and...
Post a Comment
Read full article »

MAD - Spy vs. Spy

We all love the brilliant original comic strip Spy vs. Spy, that's has been around, who knows how long, is in stopmo!
Post a Comment
Read full article »