Monday, April 25, 2016

How to Make Vintage Stop-Motion Dinosaurs


In this 1967 video from British Pathé, prehistoric model maker Arthur Hayward of London's Natural History Museum shows he constructs miniature dinosaurs for stop motion films. 



Thanks to all the people who told me about this: Torbjörn Lantz Jörgensen, Julia Lynn PowellSimon Davis, and Garin Baker

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thank you so much for posting this video. I've been obsessed with stop motion since I was a kid, especially Ray Harryhausen's work, and I try to watch and read everything I can about the model making process. There's just something magical about it and I'm so glad stop motion animation is making a comeback. It's an art form that never needs to die out.

Jared Cullum said...

I love this. I love the way the voice-over guy talks.
This animation reminds me of a dinosaur clay-mation movie I used to watch over and over when I was a kid. It was silly and called something like a "A trip back in time" or something.. Yeesh- it's been a long time. I bet it's on youtube. There was a christmas animation with some of them too, if I remember right. It's been a long time but my brother and I wore the VHS out watching it so much.

Jayson said...

It's so cool seeing how Mr. Hayward's and Mr. Gurney's workspaces and methods look so similar. :)

N'rai said...

I take it back if I ever said yours was my dream job, we have a new winner.

J L ART said...

Like Land of the Lost, but better! You think he worked with Ray Harryhausen?

James Gurney said...

Jeffrey, good question. According to one source I found, Hayward "collaborated with Ray Harryhausen (who had recently settled in London) modeling the maquettes for the stop motion dinosaur animation models for Harryhausen's films such as "One Million Years B.C." and "Valley of Gwangi"....The Harryhausen/Hayward relationship ended rather quickly for reasons still unclear. Hayward was never given onscreen credit for his work, yet he created some of film's most iconic dinosaurs." Source: http://dml.cmnh.org/2009Jun/msg00198.html

There's no mention of Hayward in the index of Harryhausen's comprehensive book on the history of model animation.

J L ART said...

That's very interesting! I'm going to have to dig a bit deeper on this. The two's work almost mirror each other, but Hayward's "seems" a bit more polished, but what do I know. Thanks for sharing! I saw your youtube video on the prehistoric bird Marquette you created! Seems like a lot of work for someone with tons of references both mental and physical at your disposal, but I appreciate your method! The final work was awesome!