make

Simple rods puppets from recycled materials

RodThese are two simple rod puppets which were made by my son when he was about 8, at a workshop that I was involved with.

The materials were recycled bits and pieces. The basic pattern was a plastic bottle for a body; a stuffed sock for the head; cardboard tubes running through the bottle neck for the neck, and for holding the puppet from below; strips of foam for the arms; wire rods for manipulating arms and hands; and odds and ends of fabric and other things (glitter, eyes, bobbles, straws, paper, offcuts of leather, ribbons and cord, and so on) for features and decoration.

The main preparation for the workshop, apart from collecting all the materials, was making the rods, though they were simple enough. They were a strong wire (it must not bend too readily), cut to size, straightened, anchored in a length of dowel at one end, and bent or hooked (so that could be poked into the foam at the wrist) at the other end. To fix the wire in the dowel, drill a hole down the centre of the dowel that the wire will fit in tightly, and then make a tiny bend in the wire a centimetre or so from the end before pushing it it. For this purpose the bend is enough of a barb to keep the wire in.

Craft glue was used to attach fabrics and foam, but we had a nifty way (I still think it’s nifty!) for the kids to attach the arms to the body: cut a X about 3 cm across into the plastic and just push the foam through. Again, the tension and points of plastic are enough to secure the foam. The elbows and wrists are made just with string tied tightly around the foam, but they are surprisingly effective.

I think the most important aspect when doing this kind of workshop (after providing basic ideas, materials, and help) is to leave the rest to the imagination of the makers, so that other ideas in construction, features, characters and the stories that inevitably emerge with them, are welcome and valued.

Simple rod puppets

Mimi Kirchner’s Big Men Dolls

Bigman2Mimi Kirchner’s big men dolls are fun. It’s interesting how different the wool patterns and texture makes them, and I really like the spoof heroic shape! This one is my favourite. As someone remarks these guys are reminiscent of David Byrne in his Big White Suit in Stop Making Sense.

Mimi also makes the best bugs, too. (And you might know by now how I like a good insect!)

Computer bug box

Computer bug

This is one side of my ‘computer bugs’ traffic control box, done for Colour-in Canberra. It’s on the corner of Corrina and Callum Streets in Woden. If you’d like to see the other sides and top, there are a few more pictures here. I think people are likely to interpret them as gremlins, but to me they are about becoming involved with the intricacy of the internet, and how rich an experience that can be.

Colour-in Canberra: The Suburban Duck

The Suburban Duck

Fox close-up

Crow

At the moment I am painting two traffic control boxes in the Urban Services project ‘Colour-in Canberra’. The first one, The Suburban Duck, is on the corner of Yamba Drive and Kitchener St in Garran, just across the road from the Canberra Hospital. It tells a story from my back garden: about how foxes are an ever present danger to ducks in the suburbs, while crows have the place staked out and steal their eggs given half a chance. Its been really enjoyable painting out in the sun on and off the last few weeks.

Catching up with Floriade

Rock & Roll Rascals: Big Bad Teddy and Long Tall Sally

The Fool Factory‘s Rock & Roll Rascals, Big Bad Ted and Long Tall Sally rock it up during this year’s Floriade in Canberra. I made Ted’s winklepickers and Sal’s legs and shoes.

Month of Softies: Halloween Goblin

This scrawny but fierce little goblin is my submission for Loobylu’s October Month of Softies theme, “All Hallow’s Hysteria”. He’s only about 5 inches tall, and made on the run.

Goblin

The Salmon-Thirty-Salmon

The cost of painting a king salmon on the fuselage of an Alaskan Airlines 373 has been roundly criticized, but the image is pretty cool. The designer was Mark Boyle, a Seattle-based wildlife artist who is also a recognized leader in the livery design of commercial aircraft. Alaskan Airlines has some pictures that show the painting in progressive stages, which took a crew of 30 painters 24 days.

Salmon

The image above was taken by Ted S. Warren for Associated Press, and shows airbrush artist Chris Coakley at work on the painting.

I was just then reminded of this wonderful image of Aragorn. It takes a second to work it out. It appeared on the side of a NZ Boeing as part of celebrations around the release of the last of the Lord of the Rings trilogy of movies.

Updated 2015: broken links. Also, there is a second version as of 2012, called the Salmon-Thirty-Salmon II:

A peep into the making of The Curse of the Were-Rabbit

The New York Times has a short slide-show of some of the sketches and models from the latest Wallace and Gromit movie, The Curse of the Were-Rabbit. I like seeing the armatures and insides:

Gromitbts

Nick Park gives the commentary. I’m not a huge fan of Aardman, but I was sorry to see the Aardman Animation studios had burnt down last week, with many of the original drawings, wooden sets, paperwork, awards and other memorabilia lost.

Preparing boby

Take a look at ‘preparing boby’, netamir’s cool photo set at Flickr, which records the making of her first puppet from wire, paper mache, foam and fabric. I love his expressions, how involved and helpful he is with making himself, and his shape!

Boby

As I’ve commented before, I really find the look of this unfinished stage of making very attractive. Thank you for letting me use one of your images, neta :-).