hey,
I picked up some plexi-glass this weekend at an industrial plastics shop, and the guy suggested to get this sort of white-translucent stuff, just wondering if that would work any better than a clear piece of plexiglass...(it'll be more worth while for me to take it back for a clear piece, since I can use it for more projects) also are there any good directions on the internet for building a cheap animation light box? ... i saw one that suggested you use a duo tang binder as a clip to hold the pages with... sounded like a good idea, just wonder if anyone's tried this.
cheaply rigged animation lightbox/table
By wicker basket head | Wednesday, November 17, 2004 at 12:08am
#1
cheaply rigged animation lightbox/table
I'm sorry but duo-tang fasteners are hardly good...unless your a bored kid in calss making a flipbook;) . BUT I do use 3 hole loose leaf paper and I made a peg bar of dowels fitting the holes' diameters (5/16", your size maybe different). You see your holes maybe bigger than the fastners..or smaller...and they're sharp so the paper would rip easier. You want your drawings relative for scanning and flipping.
The frosted plexiglass is better. After many yaers of clear plexigalss, I used some left over frosted self stick laminate made for windows (a glorified mother of all tape, the kind they use on calear bathroom windows for privacy...) on my plexi. before then I always had to have an extra papersheet at the bottom of my drawing to filter the light.
wow, thanks! I like the picture of that board too, is that the one you made? Are there any plans for that online?
I made a couple of them myself in June this year. One I made from wood, 20" across, witha rectangular piece of plexi from a defunct light box handed to me by the art teacher at work. The other I had cut for $15 at a local plastics place. The latter is 1/4" and really too densely colored to let much light through. Great for drawing away from my table, though, and has also gotten me more practice at drawing by flipping instead of drawing with light on.
Both have a slot routed into them for a pegbar--I bought 5 bars from Lightfoot Ltd at about $5 each. They're accurate and easy to fasten with or without the groove.
Love the do-it-yerself way. Cheaper and provides more connection to what you're doing, I think.
Cartoon Thunder
There's a little biker in all of us...
I've always preferred clear plexi for just that reason. Why diffuse the light before it reaches the first sheet of paper? Heck, the first sheet is going to do that for you :)
There really is no right answer - just find what works best for you.
I checked out those peg bars, and they seemed inexpensive enough on the surface, but since I'm canadian, the added expense of shipping was like 17 something dollars, which, with exchange etc... isn't all that cheap. Is there another supplier of those that can ship within canada?
BTW, that is what I have, frosted 1/4'' acrylic ... should i try and return it for a clear piece? or will it still be transparent enough :confused:
pretty much the only place to get those is from Lightfoot or his other site, www.cartoonsupplies.com. They have Lightfoot stamped on 'em, so...
I bought five last summer and I'm using three. If you pay the postage I'll send one to ya for Christmas!!
Shoot me an email through my profile.
Cartoon Thunder
There's a little biker in all of us...
No. It was handmade but not by me. I'm all thumbs.I bought it years and years ago.
But the dowel pegbar was simple enough for me.