Animation Class: Lesson 1

Animation Class: Lesson 1 is a 2002 comedic eductional brickfilm by Stefan van Zwam. It follows a teacher lecturing a class on the basic elements and equipment required to make an animated film.

An updated version of the film was created in 2004 for entry to the Stuttgart Festival of Animated Film, removing copyrighted music and adding the original song "I Animate" by Loïc Desjardins, featuring vocals from a variety of brickfilmers around the world.

Plot
A group of children attending an animation class fool around in their classroom until they are warned of the teacher's arrival. The teacher enters and begins a lesson on stop-motion animation. He asks the children what is needed to make a film, and they list elements such as script, actors, crew, and money. The teacher explains that they will need equipment to get started on animation and shows a video displaying what is required. Images of the equipment appear on a screen and the children name each item as they show up. Afterwards, the teacher declares the class to be completed for the day and the children leave excitedly.

Crew

 * Stefan van Zwam - Writer, Voice actor, Animator, Editor
 * Nate Burr - Special thanks
 * Loïc Desjardins - Composer, Performer (Updated version)
 * Felix Czepluch, Steffen Troeger, Kristian Sandberg, Brandon Pratt, Tom Dean, Rachel Dew, Stefan van Zwam - Gang vocals (Updated version)

Awards
Animation Class: Lesson 1 was the winner of the Best Brickfilm award in the 2002 Plast Awards.

Series
Despite the subtitle of Lesson 1, Stefan did not have plans to produce a second Animation Class. He did, however, express a wish for another member of the community to produce the second lesson. This offer was taken up by Nate Burr who released Animation Class 2: Frame-rate two weeks after the release of the first film.

Shortly afterwards, discussions began on who would produce a third lesson and Stefan, based on a suggestion from Jay Silver, set up a website page and submission form for members to put themselves down to make a lesson and list what theirs would be about. The third lesson was to be produced by Nick Maniatis and, over time, a multitude of filmers including Doug James, Jay Silver, Patryk Wawer, Brian Gould, Jared Gilbert, Chris Salt, James Maduzia and Steffen Troeger put their names down to produce one. However, no further installments of the series ever appeared and the idea faded away over time.

Attempts were made to revive the Animation Class series concept by Arnout "CrystalBrick" van der Maas in 2006, Graeme Allen in 2007, and Lewis Chen in 2008, but ultimately no films ever appeared from these attempts.