Meet our Stop-Motion Creatives: Michael Popp

Meet director Michael Popp!

A Brooklyn-based photographer, Michael Popp,  joined the Visual Country team 5 years ago, and in that time has been involved in every stage of our creative process including concepting, writing, fabrication and set construction, filming, and stop motion animating. Michael’s work has been featured in Vogue, Interior Design Magazine, Dwell, IdN, and So-EN, among others.

Q1. What is your background?

My background is in social sciences and economics, it’s what I studied in undergrad. But I was also into painting and got into commercial photography and I’ve used that to become a short form content creator animator here at Visual Country.

Q2. Is there any improvisation during a shoot that didn’t agreed with a client?

We do improvise on set with our short-form videos, because sometimes it’s necessary to bring an animation together. Other times we improvise if we think it’s going to make the story more engaging or compelling. But we always do it within the restraints that the client agreement that has been provided.

Q3. For Stop Motion videos, do you prefer to use continuous light or strobes?

I prefer to use constant lights when shooting stop-motion animation because it produces flicker which we usually get a lot of when we shoot with strobes.

Q4. Could you tell more about your creative process?

When trying to develop an idea further I’m always am looking, listening and waiting for something to strike me. When inspiration strike I make sure to pocket it away and think about how that could be used for a video at our stop-motion agency.

Q5. What’s the coolest part of your job as a Director?

The coolest part of my job is that I get to work on different projects all the time. Sometimes I’m painting, writing, building, and sometimes I’m animating, so it’s constantly creative. I love that part of this stop-motion animation studio.

Michael’s Work Highlights:

American Airlines

American Airlines: Behind the Scenes

*insert quote from Michael about the work he did for AmAir*

Laura Geller final video

Laura Geller: Behind the Scenes

Lowe’s

*insert quote from Michael about the work he did for Lowe’s, required a full studio build out of rooms*

Converse

Kate Somerville