Sunday 16 March 2014

It's been a while since I posted on this blog but I'm still using it for stop motion animations and related stuff........watch this space.


Thursday 5 March 2009

Puppet construction

With clothes

Foam body


Hip view



Sholder ,chest

Thigh and knee close-up








1:6 scale Brass and aluminium puppet with foam build up body.

This construction used the brass pieces from large electric block connectors. The plastic coating is removed from the brass by simply unscrewing the grip screws and pushing out the brass connector.


The picture above shows the original block connectors with a single brass connector removed, the picture also shows the beginnings of a hip section with a wire spine.

The brass connectors are soldered together using standard high temp solder; this creates the bones of the puppet to which the aluminium is passed through to create the joints.

The picture above shows a shoulder section connected to the puppet spine. The arm bones are soldered to flat brass plate at a 60 degree angle to create a shoulder for the wire arm, three further brass connectors are used as bones for the main arm and two connectors are used for the fore arm bones. It is important not to screw these connectors too tight. This will weaken and cause the aluminium wire joints to break.

The puppet skeleton is covered with standard foam used for upholstery.
The basic body shapes are glued together using spray upholstery glue, this drys quickly but can easily be prised apart if access to joints is required.In later builds I have sprayed WD40 oil on the brass connectors and screws so the foam only stick to itself and not the armature.




The picture above shows the foam torso which has been roughly sculpted or melted with an old soldering iron to create chest and stomach muscles which show through the clothing.
The puppet head is a static 1:6 scale sculpt, the eyes and mouth do not move, a post production method using Photoshop CS3 or above is used to create blinking and mouth sync movements.

This method should result in creating a strong but movable puppet for stop motion, joints can fail but the construction allows for replacing wires.
Below shows the finished puppet.


The cost of making this type of human form puppet is approximately £20.00.

Sunday 29 June 2008

My time at a naval school.

I attended The Royal Naval School Verdala , Malta from 1972- 1975, what has this to do with Bond? I here you ask, well the school was lead by none other than a real Commander, "Cdr.Bond", He even wore the uniform to prove it. This picture was taken in the winter time, in summer he wore it in white with shorts!! In a school report he wrote...."Neil is a difficult child who likes to be the centre of attention", I was 8 years old so i guess that makes me the norm then!!

1920 x 1080

Click on the image to see full size

Animation Spec

Quantum of Solace ( Tribute ) is shot at 1920 x 1080 ,16:9 ratio, unfortunately I don't know any sites that will host the completed short at HD definition as the finished uncompressed .avi is big.

Thursday 26 June 2008

The new 1:6 th scale Heckler & Koch UMP9 arrived from the States, looking good with working safety catch!!, got to get some macro shots of this into the short.


Photo taken with Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ50 fitted with macro adapter.

Wednesday 25 June 2008

Focus pull with Panasonic Lumix

I attempted a focus pull with the Panasonic Lunix DMC-FZ50 , I think it worked fine and has a very film look to it.