Gumby Chess

     The following animation reminds me of Gumby, an American clay animation character centered on a green clay humanoid character created and modeled by Art Clokey. 
     Gumby has been the subject of two television series, a feature-length film and other media. Since the original series aired, Gumby has become a famous example of stop-motion clay animation and an influential cultural icon, spawning tributes, parodies and merchandising. 
     Clay animation or claymation, sometimes plasticine animation, is one of many forms of stop motion animation. Each animated piece, either character or background, is made of a malleable substance, usually plasticine clay.
     Traditional animation is produced by recording each frame, or still picture, on film or digital media and then playing the recorded frames back in rapid succession. These and other moving images create the illusion of motion by playing back at over ten to twelve frames per second. 
     Each object or character is sculpted from clay or plasticine, usually around a wire skeleton called an armature, and then arranged on the set, where it is photographed once before being slightly moved by hand to prepare it for the next shot, and so on until the animator has achieved the desired amount of film.

     A consistent shooting environment is needed to maintain the illusion of continuity: objects must be consistently placed and lit, and work must proceed in a calm environment. The process is extremely laborious. Shooting a 30-minute movie requires making approximately 21,600 stops to change the figures for the frames. The object must not be altered by accident, slight smudges, dirt, hair, or dust. 
     This is an animation using clay of the game Roesch - Willi Schlage (Hamburg, 1910)...used and modified by Stanley Kubrick for 2001: Space Odyssey.