Coz UK
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- Joined
- Jul 6, 2012
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Hiya! Reposting this as it disappeared after I posted it. I'm posting it as a kind of build blog-come how-to. It's in two seperate posts to allow for the pics to show.
Meet Nino! He's currently my roomy. He tells me he has a famous cousin in the States on some TV show, but I think he's pulling my leg.
He thinks that T-shirt is funny. He would.
He's currently awaiting an eye transplant to some whiter eyeballs. He's got kind of a jaundiced view on everything at the moment.
He's sort of a 'mutt' or a Bitza puppet (bitza this, bitza that...) made to practice my puppet buildingninja powers - uh, skills.
He's made of red fake fur (I won't say 'faux' as it isn't even trying to look real!) from the craft store with a felt mouth lining (it was quick and cheap, okay? Sheeesh).
His head is from the Blatch pattern (available everywhere via your local internet - or here: http://puppetbuzz.com/2007/06/21/th...arded-blatch-with-full-size-pattern-download/ ) unaltered bar the addition of a slightly fuller mouthplate.
The mouthplate was made of two pieces of stiff grey cardstock onto 1/4" yellow foam. The card was covered with polar fleece glued down over a trimmed makeup sponge for finger positioning.
I then added fleece pockets to hold the fingers and thumb in place - I folded the fleece around two 1/4" foam 'D' shapes, and stitched it all together.
This, you might already know, makes it incredibly hot after 2.7 seconds (approx.) - I'll try a different method next time! I created a hand sauna.
The body is the Project Puppet Simple puppet pattern body (here: http://www.projectpuppet.com/ ), with no mods (don't worry, the rest of the pattern is gonna see a fair bit of use too! I've got, like, all of the downloadable ones now - I'm kinda spoiled for choice!).
The curved arm pattern I found over at puppetsandstuff.com in Billy D. Fullers' Gallery Album (Here: http://puppetsandstuff.com/community/index.php?action=gallery&g2_itemId=18395 ).
I altered the pattern to make the arms narrower, and shortened it a bit - tho it coulda been the size I printed it out at.
The hands I wanted to make poseable, so I used the Project Puppet instructions (Here: http://www.projectpuppet.com/servlet/Page?template=arm-rods-tutorial ) and tailor made a foam pattern for the hands with a custom palm support. I used 1/2 and 1/4 inch foam for this, as two 1/2" pieces woulds been too thick to fit, I thought.
Amazingly, I was right! I had to sit down.
At this point I realised I had a choice - fixed or removable rods? Well, in for a penny...
Removable it was - just gluing 'em on seemed a bit churlish by this point. But the doll joints I had were too big for the hands - what to do?
I'd read and understood the Puppet Planet website instructions for removable arm rods (Here: http://puppet-planet.com/rodarmtutorial.html ), which seemed the best option. I'd already bought a bag of doll joints to attatch the arms - only they were about as big as the hands were!
So do I Dremel down the doll joints? I guess I could just cut off the edge to a palm support shape, then drill holes for the finger wires, thus eliminating a step.
Very tempting, but I was sure I had something similar to doll joints...
Jean buttons! Replacement ones, actually. Metal cap, plastic body, spikey rivet to hammer in. From the fabric store. Cool.
It was so crazy it just might work.
NOTE: To calm those of a nervous disposition, please relax in the knowledge that it did actually work! And even better, still does!
I'd already custom made palm support pieces from two layers of that grey cardstock. I then reinforced it by coating them with a layer of Super Glue (Cyanoacrylate). Hardens the outside of the card like a coat of resin, pretty much.
Yeah, probably didn't need to do this, but it made me feel better about using card in there).
I made a hole in the palm support piece, and pushed the metal spikey rivet through it. Then I laid a piece of red felt in there to stop the end of the rod ripping out clumps of foam.
Stop - hammer time!
Smacked the button part onto the rivet, making sure it was fixed good and solid. I hot glued the rivet to the palm support, and added a few drops of Super Glue to the base of the button to stop it from turning.
Fingers were made from twisted garden wire, trimmed to size and glued in with both superglue and hot glue, then I used Contact Adhesive to stick the foam hand pieces together, sandwiching the palm support and the button in its red felt cocoon.
As I said earlier, I used 1/4 and 1/2 inch foam for the hand pieces, with the 1/2" piece on the outside. I followed the Project Puppet hand tutorial step by step, and found that the difference in foam thickness didn't make any difference at all.
If it wasn't for my dirty glue fingers, the puppet foam hands woulda looked just like the examples on PPs website.
Continues...
Meet Nino! He's currently my roomy. He tells me he has a famous cousin in the States on some TV show, but I think he's pulling my leg.
He thinks that T-shirt is funny. He would.
He's currently awaiting an eye transplant to some whiter eyeballs. He's got kind of a jaundiced view on everything at the moment.
He's sort of a 'mutt' or a Bitza puppet (bitza this, bitza that...) made to practice my puppet building
He's made of red fake fur (I won't say 'faux' as it isn't even trying to look real!) from the craft store with a felt mouth lining (it was quick and cheap, okay? Sheeesh).
His head is from the Blatch pattern (available everywhere via your local internet - or here: http://puppetbuzz.com/2007/06/21/th...arded-blatch-with-full-size-pattern-download/ ) unaltered bar the addition of a slightly fuller mouthplate.
The mouthplate was made of two pieces of stiff grey cardstock onto 1/4" yellow foam. The card was covered with polar fleece glued down over a trimmed makeup sponge for finger positioning.
I then added fleece pockets to hold the fingers and thumb in place - I folded the fleece around two 1/4" foam 'D' shapes, and stitched it all together.
This, you might already know, makes it incredibly hot after 2.7 seconds (approx.) - I'll try a different method next time! I created a hand sauna.
The body is the Project Puppet Simple puppet pattern body (here: http://www.projectpuppet.com/ ), with no mods (don't worry, the rest of the pattern is gonna see a fair bit of use too! I've got, like, all of the downloadable ones now - I'm kinda spoiled for choice!).
The curved arm pattern I found over at puppetsandstuff.com in Billy D. Fullers' Gallery Album (Here: http://puppetsandstuff.com/community/index.php?action=gallery&g2_itemId=18395 ).
I altered the pattern to make the arms narrower, and shortened it a bit - tho it coulda been the size I printed it out at.
The hands I wanted to make poseable, so I used the Project Puppet instructions (Here: http://www.projectpuppet.com/servlet/Page?template=arm-rods-tutorial ) and tailor made a foam pattern for the hands with a custom palm support. I used 1/2 and 1/4 inch foam for this, as two 1/2" pieces woulds been too thick to fit, I thought.
Amazingly, I was right! I had to sit down.
At this point I realised I had a choice - fixed or removable rods? Well, in for a penny...
Removable it was - just gluing 'em on seemed a bit churlish by this point. But the doll joints I had were too big for the hands - what to do?
I'd read and understood the Puppet Planet website instructions for removable arm rods (Here: http://puppet-planet.com/rodarmtutorial.html ), which seemed the best option. I'd already bought a bag of doll joints to attatch the arms - only they were about as big as the hands were!
So do I Dremel down the doll joints? I guess I could just cut off the edge to a palm support shape, then drill holes for the finger wires, thus eliminating a step.
Very tempting, but I was sure I had something similar to doll joints...
Jean buttons! Replacement ones, actually. Metal cap, plastic body, spikey rivet to hammer in. From the fabric store. Cool.
It was so crazy it just might work.
NOTE: To calm those of a nervous disposition, please relax in the knowledge that it did actually work! And even better, still does!
I'd already custom made palm support pieces from two layers of that grey cardstock. I then reinforced it by coating them with a layer of Super Glue (Cyanoacrylate). Hardens the outside of the card like a coat of resin, pretty much.
Yeah, probably didn't need to do this, but it made me feel better about using card in there).
I made a hole in the palm support piece, and pushed the metal spikey rivet through it. Then I laid a piece of red felt in there to stop the end of the rod ripping out clumps of foam.
Stop - hammer time!
Smacked the button part onto the rivet, making sure it was fixed good and solid. I hot glued the rivet to the palm support, and added a few drops of Super Glue to the base of the button to stop it from turning.
Fingers were made from twisted garden wire, trimmed to size and glued in with both superglue and hot glue, then I used Contact Adhesive to stick the foam hand pieces together, sandwiching the palm support and the button in its red felt cocoon.
As I said earlier, I used 1/4 and 1/2 inch foam for the hand pieces, with the 1/2" piece on the outside. I followed the Project Puppet hand tutorial step by step, and found that the difference in foam thickness didn't make any difference at all.
If it wasn't for my dirty glue fingers, the puppet foam hands woulda looked just like the examples on PPs website.
Continues...