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Filmmaking Camera, lighting, sound, editing and the crew roles behind every shot.

Claymation: Meaning & Definition in Film

A stop-motion animation form using malleable clay figures.

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Origins and Development

Early clay animation dates to the 1910s, but Art Clokey’s Gumby popularized it on television. Claymation combines stop-motion techniques with the pliability of plasticine figures.

Claymation: Artistic Advantages

Clay’s malleability allows for expressive facial and body movements, enabling exaggerated performances and rapid prototyping of character designs.

Claymation: Production Workflow

Artists sculpt figures around armatures, then adjust poses incrementally. Lighting, camera setup and frame rate decisions influence final texture and motion smoothness.

Claymation: Iconic Examples

Aardman Animations’ Shaun the Sheep, Will Vinton’s The Adventures of Mark Twain and Chicken Run showcase claymation’s narrative versatility and global appeal.

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More Filmmaking Terms

Entries filed on the same shelf as Claymation, each with the one-line answer first. They are the words that usually come up in the same conversation.

All 913 terms

  • Sting

    A brief, punctuating musical cue used to accentuate dramatic moments or transitions.

  • Step Outline

    A step outline is a pre-writing document that breaks a story down into its core sequential steps, with each step typically describing a single scene in a short paragraph.

  • Pre-Production

    The planning phase of a film project involving design, logistics, and resource allocation before shooting begins.

  • Jib

    A jib is a boom device with a camera on one end and a counterweight on the other, used to create sweeping, crane-like shots.

  • Slit Scan

    Narrow aperture photography stretches space-time into psychedelic tunnels—immortalised by Kubrick’s star-gate.

  • Rear Projection

    A live-action technique projecting pre-filmed backgrounds behind actors.