MonkeyJam User Guide MonkeyJam is a free piece of stop-motion animation software.
It's easy to use – all you need is some sort of camera to connect
to your computer.
Opening MonkeyJam
1. Click the Start button > All programs > ICT Department >
MonkeyJam
The program should open and look like the screenshot.
You can resize the window if needed
Setting Up
You need to check some settings.
A) Set the Frames Per Second
1. Click Settings > FPS
2. Select 12 > OK
3. Or you can go Settings > FPS > Other >
enter a value (6 perhaps) > OK
The higher the number the more images you have to take per second of movie. Twelve FPS is fairly
normal.
B) Check the image format
1. Click Settings > Image format
2. Make sure Jpeg or PNG are selected
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C) Change the Save location
1. Click Settings > Preferences
2. Click on the \... button for the Default
Storage Area
3. Click to select your user name from the
list you get
4. Click New folder
5. Give your folder a sensible name > Click OK
6. Click OK to confirm > Click OK to close
Preferences
This will have created a new folder in your user area to
store new animation shots in. As each animation is made
up of lots of images it will soon have lots of images in it!
Note: you can also set the FPS here – it’s normal that there is more than one way to do a job like
this with a piece of software
D) Add a Layer
You can’t capture images without a layer in place. MonkeyJam won’t do this for
you even when you start a new movie.
1. Click Edit > Add Layer (shortcut: Ctrl + L)
2. Give the layer a sensible name
3. IMPORTANT: Change the file location to the folder you just set up
MonkeyJam might automatically look in the right folder for you or it might not. If you don't
change the location all your images will get dumped in your main user area
4. If you accidentally add more than one layer you can delete them – Edit >
Delete Layer
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E) Set up Cameras
1. Plug a webcam (or another camera if you're using one) into a USB port on
the computer.
2. Click on the Open Video Capture button (the
one that looks like a camera). F6 is the
shortcut for this.
3. Click Mode > Stop Motion
4. Click Camera > choose the webcam (probably FaceCam VGA if it’s one of
mine)
5. Click Size > choose 320 x 240
This is quite small but will take up a lot less storage space than a bigger animation
You are now ready to capture images
Capturing images
1. Click the Capture button. Every time you click
Capture a single image gets taken
You can close the Video Capture window any time you
want and reopen it to keep on capturing images
The icons at the top of the Capture window let you
rotate an image or turn it black and white if needed
Saving your project
1. Click File > Save as
This will save the file as an exposure sheet. It won’t play as a movie yet
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Previewing your work
1. Click Tools > Preview (or use the preview icon at the top of the screen)
Exporting as a movie
1. Click File > Export avi
2. Find the Video Compressor box and choose MJPEG from the dropdown options
3. Click Save Movie
This will save your work in avi format. This is a fairly standard movie format which is
viewable on most computers and can be edited in movie making software
Editing tips
•
There are handy Undo and Redo buttons on the interface
•
You can add any still image you already have to your animation:
1. Click File > Import > Images
2. Find the folder your images are in, click to choose
an image and then use the Add Files button to
move it to the right hand side
3. Click Import. The images will be added to the
animation at the point you clicked
This lets you add titles or any other image you need to your animation project
•
Images can be dragged around the Layer, but only to an empty frame. To add frames
click Edit > Insert Frame – this will insert a frame where you are clicked. Edit > Add 10
Frames will add 10 new frames to the end of the layer
•
You could also take one of the images your capture in your animation
and edit it in another piece of software – you might want to add a
speech bubble, a Kerpow! or another character.
•
You can make the same image last for more than one frame - click on
the shot and drag it down. BUT you can only do this if there's space
underneath
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