New Puppet; Working Progress

 A new puppet! Headless, handless and footless at the moment...

Inside the body is a simple wire armature to allow the limbs to bend, in case I decide to try and animate the puppet.

I hope to add a lot more detail to the body, like a pocket watch to make it more interesting!

The body turned out to be a bit of an odd shape; from the side view it's a bit like Lurch from the Addams family! But I think it adds more character! :D

Also the shirt collar is really high so it's head is going to be really weird looking!!

 

I was originally going to make a new head for this puppet but I've decided to re-use one I already have...who was never given a body!

I think the expression works really well with the sort of personality I want the puppet to have.

Next steps: Attach the head and give him some hands an feet the poor sod..

I'm going to come up with some concept sketches for an illustration; I really want to create a small set to photograph him in made from old, found objects so will look into that.

After that I might try a bit of animation :)

Animation Experiment

Here is a quick animation experiment I did this afternoon using one of my own puppets! It's not the best, I'm not really an animator, just wanted to make my work come to life :) 

It was interesting to learn how different materials would need to be used in order to make a puppet for animation. This puppet was made of quite sturdy wire so was fairly difficult to move the way I wanted it to. Also I had to tie a piece of string to his head to help him walk as he is too top heavy and wouldn't stand alone!

I used iStopmotion to produce this, which I'm loving at the moment..it's so easy to use and great to make smoother animation as you can select the frame rate.

A Lonely Bear

(2011)

An illustration from memory, of a teddy bear that I always used to visit in my grandad's house :)

More Experimentation

Above is a fairly quick experiment with my new puppet. I wanted to really show emotion in this piece and I'm really pleased with how the layers have worked together to create quite an abstract and perhaps unsettling emotion in the image. However, the puppet sort of goes to waste a bit as you can't fully see him..perhaps I'll continue experimenting with another composition or full body photograph.

When creating this image, I had a lot of inspiration from my grandad's work which I recently looked through..unfortunately he isn't here to ask what the majority of it is about! But I really like the abstract element in his work and a lot of his stuff was inspired by constructivism.

I tried to bring this element into this piece, by using lots of digital collage and building the composition up with shapes.

When taking a second look at the piece, I decided to make the colour scheme more vibrant. It is based on the Man in the Moon, so I changed the black and white background to a deep blue like the night's sky. I made the red part - which is actually a heart shape - more vibrant. I wanted to show the man's longing to visit the world below, and loneliness.

I'm really happy with all the textures coming through in this image and the distorted/abstracted content. I think there is just enough information (the face, heart etc.) to be able to look at it and be able to guess what it might be about. In other words, it isn't so abstracted that it means nothing - which is a bonus!

Please let me know what you think if you read any of these posts lol it's always nice to get feedback! And don't forget to follow me on Facebook, Twitter etc!

Finished Puppet and Illustration Experiment

Random experimenting with the finished puppet...

It's rubbish!! Haha need to try photographing him better..once I've mastered that I might turn in into a sort of storybook/graphic novel so I can do close ups and things, as the facial expression isn't very clear on this one...

Clown Puppet Update

Attached head and collar thing..This is the largest puppet I've made so far, measuring roughly 14 inches from head to toe :)

Clown Puppet!

Currently working on a clown puppet! Above is the head (obviously) which looks a bit weird at the moment, but hopefully will look better when it's all painted. Going for a sort of Pierrot look for this figure..I love the whole look of Pierrot and mime clowns :) 

My main inspiration for this puppet has come from a story called "The Man In The Moon" by Frank L. Baum (read it here). I imagined the main character to look like one of these clowns..I want to produce an illustration with quite a lonely, melancholy feel to it. I want to communicate the emotion of loneliness in the character through the puppet's body language and expression.

The body is made of a sturdy wire armature which will enable me to bend the puppet into various positions...and covered in a fabric suit which I handmade and padded out a bit to give his torso a bit of shape :) I wanted him to look like he was in a sleep suit! But I dunno if it looks like that..

Updates will follow :)