A new children’s book called Gallop!: A Scanimation Picture Book by Rufus Seder is being talked about by both kids and adults. The book uses a six-phase animation process caleld to scanimation to give the illusion of movement.
A first book of motion for kids, it shows a horse in full gallop and a turtle swimming up the page. A dog runs, a cat springs, an eagle soars, and a butterfly flutters. Created by Rufus Butler Seder, an inventor, artist, and filmmaker fascinated by antique optical toys, Scanimation is a state-of-the-art six-phase animation process that combines the “persistence of vision” principle with a striped acetate overlay to give the illusion of movement. It harkens back to the old magical days of the kinetoscope, and the effect is astonishing, like a Muybridge photo series springing into action-or, in terms kids can relate to, like a video without a screen. Complementing the art is a delightful rhyming text full of simple questions and fun, nonsense replies: Can you gallop like a horse? giddyup-a-loo! Can you strut like a rooster? cock-a-doodle-doo!
Publishers Weekly gave the book a starruddy review and said the black-and-white images reference Eadweard Muybridge’s motion photography.
Readers will gasp with delight when they open this book,produced as paper-over-board: a hidden tab in each heavy page slides an acetate layer printed with vertical black lines over an encoded, detailed image of a horse, rooster, turtle or other creature, and the layers’ interaction creates the illusion of motion. The black-and-white images openly reference the motion photography of Eadweard Muybridge (an influence that Seder acknowledges on the copyright page) and they contrast with the bright palette used for the spare, reader-directed text.
The Washington Post says, “Gallop, by Rufus Butler Seder, made an obvious case for itself with ooh-ah graphics, using trademarked Scanimation, a low-tech marvel of sliding paper and stripes. Turn the page, and you set black-and-white pictures of various animals into motion - that is, if certain brief people ever let you turn the page. Your kids will elbow you out of the way. They will also elbow each other out of the way.”
More reviews of the book can be found on Chasing Cheerios, Grandkids Gift Guide, School Library Journal, Gearhead Mom and Babygadget. (via Buzzfeed)
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Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog
