Cynematik • Cyndi Greening

Tim Burton’s newest stop-motion film, THE CORPSE BRIDE, was produced in a completely digital form. Prior to this film, digital cameras had never been used for stop motion, a highly specialized process. In the end, the crew chose the Canon EOS 1Ds Mark II. The 16.7-megapixel cameras could deliver high-definition, high-quality stills for almost instantaneous output to Final Cut Pro, the team’s editing tool of choice.

The production crew at Three Mills Studios used two-dozen Canon cameras and five Power Mac G5 desktops. They also had about $100,000-worth of Nikon lenses at their disposal. To mate the lenses to the Canon bodies, they used NEOS adapters. In any stop-motion production, the crew likes to see what the camera sees before they take a snapshot. No digital SLR is equipped with a video-out port, so the team mounted tiny video cameras just above the lenses to get a live preview as they animated.

Three Mills Studios also worked on Danny Boyle’s MILLIONS and 28 DAYS LATER. Boyle is currently working on the sequel, 28 WEEKS LATER. No doubt Three Mills will be in on that as well.