My Uncle Oswald - Hands

My Uncle Oswald - Heads

Stag - Fur

        A concern which had been lurking at the back of my mind since I began working on the stag puppet was exactly how I would create the fur. While faux fur fabrics are abundant, most aim to look as realistic as possible, with accurate pattern sizes and pile lengths. Just as a human puppet needs clothing made of fabrics which will drape and sit correctly when cut on a small scale, so to would I need a 'miniature' fur or hair solution. 

        To create the furry characters of Fantastic Mr Fox Mackinnon & Saunders had used goat hair, cut, dyed and applied as necessary. This would not be a viable option for me. I considered using other fabrics such as velvet or sued, which might pass as deer pelt but be thinner and more workable than faux fur. Yet they would lack the depth and visual interest.

        Eventually I found a material which purported to be imitation deer fur, with wonderful depth and colour variation, and a relatively short pile length of 1cm. While this is still a little too thich for the scale of my puppet, the stag does not look swamped, but rather a little bulky and shaggy, as though he has a winter coat. I could have trimmed down the sponge body a little further to compensate for the added thickness of the fur, but sadly I was running short of time.

        There were however areas such as the face and lower legs on which the fur would have been too thick, drowning out some of the finer detail. On these points I made use of a very thin and flexible faux leather, and fine knitting. While the combination of different fabrics may draw attention to the artificiality of the puppet, as I learned during Context of Practice, a strong puppet can embrace an artificial aesthetic as long as the underlying structure enables it to give a convincing performance. Hopefully the time and effort spent on the armature and its sponge covering will give the stag this ability.

Stag - Antlers & Head

Golden Dragon - Armature Construction

        Whilst at Manchester Animation Festival, Animation Toolkit had on display the armature for what looked to be a dragon or winged dinosaur. There looked to be about 15 ball and socket joints in the tail alone, in gradually decreasing sizes, with only marginally fewer in the neck. This was obviously a beautifully made custom armature, far outside of my reach. Even if I adapted an armature kit, purchasing additional joints, the cost would be astronomical. Fortunately, during their presentation, Animation Toolkit mentioned more cost effective ways of constructing armatures, namely twisted wire covered with metal tubing. The exposed wire would form joints. While time consuming, this technique would be far more economical, while allowing me the opportunity to gain a greater understanding of the nature of armatures.

        Working closely to my design, I proceeded to cut the correct lengths of tubing, before fixing them in place along lengths of twisted wire (three or four strands depending upon the required flexibility of a limb or body part) using JB weld.

        There are however large disadvantages to this technique. Joints which bear repeat manipulation and stress can be liable to snap and break, while there may prove to be too much freedom in some joints, as they can bend in any direction without restriction. Also, the springy nature of the wire means that the puppet may bounce back when being posed or animated. It is for this last reason that I attempted to keep the wire malleable, yet strong enough to support the weight of the puppet (fortunately it will only be covered by stuffing and knitting).

Stag - Neck

        A major concern with the stag puppet was his neck, and how to achieve the voluminous shape dictated by my designs without obstructing the movement of the armature, particularly when the neck extended towards the ground. The car cleaning sponge was far too dense, not only preventing the neck from moving extensively, but pulling the armature out of poses back into its own 'resting' position. Even with layers of thinner packaging foam the problem persisted.

I tried hollowing out the sponge, to reduce resistance,
but to no avail.

         It soon became apparent that it would not be possible to include the large throat I had envisaged, at least not in a solid sculpted form. Instead I built a thinner neck which essentially only covered the armature rods rather than providing shape an body. This thin structure could then move freely within a loose covering of 'skin', which could be cut in such a fashion as to roughly reproduce the large throat I had envisaged.

        This is an excellent example of how a designer might need to adapt their vision to fit with the requirements and limitations of stop motion animation and puppet making. Hand drawn animation is in a way a lot more freeing, as characters can be all manner of extreme and physics defying shapes yet still move freely. While stop motion animation has its fair share of exaggerated characters (notably Tim Burton's spindly figures), it is important to bear in mind when designing a character the viability and ease of building it as a puppet.