Ladislas Starevich (Alternatively Starewicz, Starevitch, Starewich and Starewitch, that last one sounds pretty cool and funny) was a Russian and French stop-motion animator notable as the author of the first ever puppet-animated film titled "The Beautiful Lukinada" in 1912. Starewics however might have been even better known for using dead insects in most of his stop motion films, particularly "Cameramen's Revenge", and while surprisingly gorgeous to look at, was hilariously morbid to me (Especially since I couldn't stop thinking about how cute "The Cameraman's Revenge" was as I watched it with my class)… but what the heck, am I right? These are just insects, they weren't meant to live long anyway, at least they are being used for art.
Although his name means very little nowadays, Starevich ranks alongside Walt Disney as one of the great animation pioneers, and it is without a doubt a fact that he is the pioneer of puppet animation. His career started nearly a decade before Disney's and it is interesting to note that the man became an animator by accident…
Having always been fascinated by insects (Ooh horror story in the making here), he bought a camera and attempted to film them, only to accidentally kill them every time with the hot camera lights. It is then he realized that stop-motion animation provided an instant (if slow) solution, and it was right then did Starevich discover his natural talent for it.
I also found it absolutely amazing how he was able to handle these insects so carefully when posing them for his animation, surely it must have been challenging considering how small and delicate they are, especially their limbs.
I know stop-motion goes further back than any other animation technique, but it is still really awesome seeing how creative stop-motion animators can get up to this day, being able to use other things aside from puppets and clay models...
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