As a final little experiment I have decided that I want to attempt to make a zoetrope and I think that I can do it well. I have chosen from my mini series Locked Up as I feel this one has jus the right amount of images to create a zoetrope with and it will look good. I don’t think that it will particularly be a working one but I feel that when I get the basis of it all it will be fairly straight forward. I feel that this could be a really great idea as this is something that the Victorians used before there was the invention of cinema and moving image. I feel that this could bring my work to the next level and add on to the whole idea of having my work look like it is from the late 1800s as well as the images being based in the same time period. I watched a few YouTube videos on how to actually make a zoetrope and think that I pretty much get how I could go about making my own one. This is just going to an experiment and see whether or not it looks good enough to make it into my little box filled with late 1800s inspired work.

How To | Make A Zoetrope

Here is how I made my mini zoetrope. Firstly, I got my images onto one A4 piece of paper, printed them out and split them in two. I then backed each of them on some black card using the spray mount. After this I made the slits at the top of the card using a standing knife, this took me about half an hour but has actually turned out better than I had expected.  I stuck the images to the card and then curved it round to create a circle, it didn’t turn out too perfect but I don’t really mind that. I have also painted a chop stick black to use as the twirling part of the zoetrope. I have cut another piece of card to use as the bottom of the zoetrope and need to cut it in a circle so that it fits on the inside of the whole thing. So far it has turned out better than expected. Something that I realised is that the images are possibly too low down and the slits aren’t long enough but that’s ok as it is supposed to be from the Victorian times and I don’t mind if it is perfect or not. I added a little bit of foam board and cut it into a small circle underneath the whole thing just so that the stick wouldn’t more around too much and painted it black, I also made another small one and put it onto the inside using a glue stick and a hot glue gun. This just made the stick more secure in the whole thing. Overall I am happy with how it has come out especially as it was a first attempt and I basically just went off of intuition for the whole thing. The end result is a bit rough around the edges but I really don’t mind as it was a last minute idea which turned out better than expected.