With facilities that are second to none and with close industry ties including the famous puppet makers Mackinnon & Saunders and Aardman Animation, the Stop Motion Animation degree course is extremely popular with students wishing to pursue a career in stop motion animation.
But while the department boasts first class facilities and equipment which enable students to get real hands on experience, Manoubi Ben Lamri, the university's specialist technical instructor for animation, had one issue he wanted to solve - how to de-clutter the small studio spaces and enable the students to move more freely around their sets.
Following a chance meeting with Doughty Engineering's Mark Chorley at IBC in London earlier this year, Manoubi realised that the company would be able to help create a less chaotic, safer space in which the students could carry out their practical work. Manoubi explained, "The studios are not big spaces - but the sets are not particularly large either. The lack of space was a result of the lighting,which was on stands, so we had the additional issue of trailing cables. The students would find themselves knocking things over as they moved around to make tiny alterations to their sets, which is a problem in itself, but when you're animating, just a little disturbance to the position of the light will ruin the next shot."
Following their initial meeting, Mark travelled up to Stoke-on-Trent, the home of the Animation Awards at Staffordshire University and worked with Manoubi to create the solution. He explained, "The floor lighting and cables were more than just an inconvenience - we decided that the most suitable solution would involve getting rid of all the lighting stands and suspending the lights using the Doughty Studio Frame. This modular system can be easily constructed to suit most spaces and offers a safe working load that is adequate to support most modern day lighting. Adding two pantographs and three bars for the lighting, the students now have all the flexibility they need without any of the trip hazards."
Manoubi added, "Mark came to this project full of enthusiasm for making the studio as spacious as possible for the students. The entire process of working with Doughty Engineering has been second to none - from first meeting at the show things moved very quickly and our first studio is up and running and receiving excellent feedback - the students are fighting for time in the studio so we have had to give priority to the third years until we complete all our other studios too."
The system has proved such a success that Manoubi was keen to promote it at this year's Degree Show. "The feedback is amazing. This is a system that is affordable enough for students to perhaps purchase for themselves but professional enough that several of our ex-students with their own small animation studios are really interested in adopting it. We look forward to completing further studios with Doughty over the summer."
Stuart Messinger, the award leader for the Animation and Stop Motion Animation & Puppet Making courses added, "We are delighted with the results from this partnership with Doughty and their help in developing our Stop Motion facilities. I am very excited to see the Doughty Studio Frames in use by our students - I know it will greatly benefit their work."
(Jim Evans)
