the hole story continued

Chapter 2

After what seemed like two minutes I hit a soft patch of sand below. I rubbed my back as I stood up. Where was I? I had fallen down so far I hadn't kept track of how far I had fallen. When I looked up I saw a distant crack of light about two miles above my head. Claustrophobia started to overwhelm me. I was so far down and couldn't get back up to the top. I tried grabbing onto the wall and pulling my self up, but I would just slip back down with no process. After twenty tries I wiped my head of sweat. I pounded the wall frustatedly. To my dismay the hole started to close leaving me in total darkness. I cried into my hands and lay down on the sand.

My hopes rose when I could hear a whimpering. I felt around the hole, but there was no Skamp. He must have found a way out! I thought feeling around the walls of the hole. When my hand came to a small tunnel I was as triumphant as can be.

I could barely fit squish my caterpillar shaped body through the tunnel. I struggled for breath, for every time I would breathe in, sand would get in my mouth. Amazingly I began to see a light. I crawled as fast as a worm trying to escape a bird through the tunnel until I finally climbed out into an amazing world!

a continuation to to the story about the girl on the beach

"What is it Skamp?" I asked following him to the slope. There lay a hole two feet deep and four feet wide. "Oh Skamp!!! You brought me all the way over here to show me the hole that you dug." As I turned to go I noticed the hole was getting way bigger.

Now the hole streched seven feet wide and seemed to go on forever. Skamp walked towards the hole. "Skamp noooooo!!!" I started running towards the hole. Skamp jumped down into the hole. "Skamp come here boy," I frantically cried adding a bunch of whistles. I looked around for someone to help me, but the beach was deserted.

I couldn't leave Skamp by himself. He was my best friend as far as dogs go. If I jumped in the hole I would be risking my life. On the other hand no one would miss me. My mother and father already had seven other kids to deal with. I didn't have any friends so why not go for it. I walked towards the edge of the hole. I took three big breaths and jumped into the dark depths below.

My European Explorer Claymation Reflection

Clay, glue, toothpicks, and shells are just some of the materials we used to make our European Explorer Claymation for Mr. Bergquist’s 8th Grade American Studies Class. This project stretched over two months, and was quite a challenging journey. We chose Francisco Pizarro four our European explorer because we thought he had an interesting name. Through this project we learned how to research, summarize, plan, improvise, create, recreate and most of all have exciting!
The most enjoyable part of this project was actually creating the claymation. We really had to work together to come up with how we were going to show Pizarro’s life. It was really pleasurable taking the pictures and then being able to view them as a moving picture. I really took pleasure in being able to work with Raelani on this project. It seemed like a very difficult project at first and it felt like a real accomplishment to finish the project and actually have it turn out pretty well!!
The hardest part of this project was getting each scene in on time. This was difficult because each scene took about twenty minutes to shoot. You then had to upload the photos onto the computers which also took another twenty minutes. Uploading to your iMovie took about another five minutes. This meant that from photo to movie took a minimum of forty five minutes. Mr. Bergquist is a very busy man. He has to check a lot of projects throughout the class period. We waited patiently for our turn for out project to be checked.

An important thing that I learned from this project is that slow and steady really does win the race. When you are shooting each scene, you need to be careful to move the clay figures only a little at a time. You also want to make sure that you take a lot of photos so that when you create your movie it flows better and the movement looks smoother. If you move the figures quickly and don’t take a lot of photos, your scene will end up choppy. If you do not take your time in taking the photos and moving the figures you may end having to shoot the scene again. It pays to take your time in the first place; it really pays off in the end.

In conclusion, I really have gained an appreciation for claymation and the work that goes into it. When I think about movies like Wallace and Grommet or Chicken Run I have some understanding of how much work and creativity was needed to create these movies. I also was able to learn about Francisco Pizarro in depth. It was interesting to learn about the explorer’s early life and what may have leaded him to want to explore in the first place. I also thought it was beneficial watching everyone else’s creative process as they completed this project.

Francisco Pizarro Claymation