Monday, November 29, 2021

Making puppets

 No idea why, but lately I've been watching a lot of videos on how to make puppets. All sorts of different types, ranging from the "cut up old shag carpet" muppets-style monsters, to foam latex insanely-complex articulated full-feature puppets to finger puppets and "kids can make it at home from old socks" style puppets.

It's a bit silly, because although I could just use the camera on my phone (or the actual video camera that I have) to record puppet shows for free, it would still need sets, backgrounds, lighting and who knows what else to put something halfway decent together. Great if there is plenty of spare cash lying around, not so good for my circumstances.

The biggest issue is that a single puppet doing on thing on the screen is inherently boring. So I'd need some fellow puppeteers in order to have two or more characters on the screen at one time. Or green screen it and try to do the puppets separately and then composite them together. That's something I can totally do, it's just a lot of extra work... and I don't have a green screen. I used to, but I sold it years ago along with my other camera gear.

I don't know how much of a puppet-making community in this town, but I don't see it being a huge hive of activity. We're not exactly known for creative endeavors. I've also had a look at fabric prices, and that stuff isn't in the "buy a bunch on a whim" range.

Maybe have a look at animation, again? I did have a bit of a go back in 2017 (and 2007 if we count my Lego stop-motion, but I no longer have the Lego and trying to do stop motion in a house with four cats is an exercise in futility!)

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