Topic: Adobe ImageReady Animation

The use of Adobe ImageReady for animation purposes has become obsolete as the functions in ImageReady come bundled with Photoshop as of CS3. I have an older Photoshop that has ImageReady however, so i had to learn to create animations with that program. The new CS3 process is probably similar though.
To start you need to create multiple layers. Each layer will become a separate frame in the animation. Since each of my frames will also have individual layers themselves, I'll have to make and flatten each one individually before I begin animating. Once the frame layers are created, you need to create each frame through the animation window. To assign a layer to a frame, it simply has to be the only visible one when the frame is selected, therefore two or more layers could also become one frame if needed. This is the bulk of the process, after each frame is created you can control the time delay from frame to frame and whether the animation will loop or not. All this is done through the animation window as well. Finally, you can save the animation as a layered Photoshop file, and export it as an animated GIF, HTML page, Flash, or Quicktime movie.

http://www.mediacollege.com/adobe/discontinued/imageready/animation/layers.html

Artist: The Brothers Quay

The Brothers Quay consists of Stephen and Timothy Quay, American identical twin brothers. They were born in 1947 and moved to England to study at the Royal College of Art in London. To this day, they are two of the most influential stop motion animators.
Their animations, the bulk of their work, are short films, but they have produced a few live action feature films. The animations they produce are generally dark and moody, often portraying creepy dolls as characters in dirty urban settings. The films lack dialog, relying on dramatic musical scores and sound effects to relay their themes. The visuals of the short films really demonstrate the power of stop motion animation when in the hands of someone as imaginative and patient as they are, and act as the perfect medium to portray their dark thematic influences. What amazes me is how detailed the sets and props are, achieving a stylized, aged look that makes you wonder how many dusty attics they must have sifted through to come up with all these unusual items.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brothers_Quay