Aside from being a beloved movie, The Nightmare Before Christmas was a full-length stop motion production, a rarity considering the resources needed to produce the number of frames to fill over an hour of screen time.

What techniques are used in The Nightmare Before Christmas animation?

The Nightmare Before Christmas is a stop-motion, animated film. The actual characters were not animated, but physical sculptures that were repositioned for every single shot until they created a coherent sequence of pictures—thus, stopping the sculptures and putting the shots together to create motion.

What was used to make The Nightmare Before Christmas?

The filmmakers constructed 227 puppets to represent the characters in the movie, with Jack Skellington having "around four hundred heads", allowing the expression of every possible emotion. Sally's mouth movements "were animated through the replacement method.

Is Zero Claymation in Nightmare Before Christmas?

Ultimately, that idea was abandoned in favor of Zero being animated in stop-motion and added in at a percentage to each scene to give it the ghostly look.

Why does Tim Burton use stop-motion?

Burton was compelled to utilize stop-motion animation because it could bring something purely imagined to vivid life in a way that 2-D animation couldn't.

The Making Of-The Nightmare Before Christmas

What was Tim Burton's first stop-motion?

While at Disney in 1982, Burton made his first short, Vincent, a six-minute black-and-white stop motion film based on a poem written by Burton, which depicts a young boy who fantasizes that he is his hero Vincent Price, with Price himself providing narration.

Did Tim Burton use stop-motion?

Puppet stop-motion animation has been the preferred method for venerable directors like Tim Burton (producer of The Nightmare Before Christmas), Charlie Kaufman (Anomalisa), and Wes Anderson (Fantastic Mr. Fox).

Who was Jack Skellington before he died?

Jack Skellington's appearance in James and the Giant Peach as Captain Jack suggests that he was a pirate before he died, explaining his chaotic actions in The Nightmare Before Christmas.

How much of Nightmare Before Christmas is stop-motion?

Yet three decades on, Burton maintained that the original animated film was a one-of-a-kind feat. “In a certain way that's the beautiful thing about it as it is. It's one movie. It's stop motion and it tells its story.

What is the difference between stop-motion and claymation?

There are six main types of stop motion. Object-Motion is the art of moving or animating found objects, while claymation involves sculpting characters from clay. Pixilation uses people and cutout-motion makes the most of moving paper and other 2D materials.

Are Henry Selick and Tim Burton friends?

Selick and Burton first became friends while enrolled in CalArts' animation program, and later found themselves working together at Walt Disney Animation Studios in the early '80s. "We bonded, because we weren't the typical Disney people," says Selick. "We couldn't draw their characters perfectly."

How long did it take to animate Nightmare Before Christmas?

"The Nightmare Before Christmas" took over three years to make. Because the film was stop-motion it took animators about three years to complete the film.

Was Corpse Bride stop-motion?

Corpse Bride is the third stop-motion feature film produced by Burton and the first directed by him (the previous two films, The Nightmare Before Christmas and James and the Giant Peach, were directed by Henry Selick). This is also the first stop-motion feature from Burton that was distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures.

Is Coraline all stop-motion?

Coraline is the first-ever stop-motion animated feature to be conceived and photographed in Stereoscopic 3D. The process included shooting two pictures for each frame – a left-eye frame and a right-eye frame – with the same camera.

Will there ever be a Nightmare Before Christmas 2?

While a true feature film sequel seems unlikely, The Nightmare Before Christmas has continued to live on in other media such as video games and books, offering fans alternative ways to explore the magical world of Halloweentown.

What's Tim Burton's style?

The art of contrasting design

The American suburbia Tim Burton aesthetic is defined by bright and bold colors, as well as 1960s architecture and cars. It stands in stark contrast to Burton's theatrical side, which is defined by Gothic overtones and mechanical machinations and heavily inspired by German Expressionism.

Was Jack Skellington in Beetlejuice?

Jack Skellington has made nine cameos outside of The Nightmare Before Christmas, including in films like Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands. Jack Skellington's iconic face and figure can be spotted in various forms throughout other movies, showcasing Tim Burton's distinctive style and affinity for Halloween.

Why is Oogie Boogie afraid of Jack?

After hearing stories about the supposed "Pumpkin King" of Halloween Town, an envious Oogie Boogie became obsessed with outclassing Jack as the scariest ghoul there is. His manner of doing so developed into a coup to take over Halloween and rebranding it as "Crawloween"—a holiday dedicated to bugs.

Are Frankenweenie Corpse Bride and Nightmare Before Christmas connected?

Various theories claim Burton's animated movies – The Nightmare Before Christmas (which was made from a story by Burton), Corpse Bride, and Frankenweenie – are all connected, with some going as far as to claim that Victor Frankenstein, Victor Van Dort, and Jack Skellington are the same character, with their movies ...

Is Frankenweenie real stop-motion?

Frankenweenie is a 2012 American 3D stop-motion animated science fiction horror comedy film directed by Tim Burton, written by John August, and starring Catherine O'Hara, Martin Short, Martin Landau, Charlie Tahan, Atticus Shaffer, and Winona Ryder.

Is Coraline stop-motion or CGI?

Coraline is a 2009 American stop motion animated dark fantasy horror film written and directed by Henry Selick, based on Neil Gaiman's novella of the same name.

Was Tim Burton a loner?

But for Burton, a recluse, they seemed out of reach. "You kind of feel like you're alone and nobody understands you, and you think you're the only person who feels that way," he says.