Final Project Animation - Week 11: Puppet Making

EXD300 Easter Break

 Week 11

    Over the Easter Break, I successfully made a paper puppet with wire rigged joints.

    Above is a production list of analogue set-pieces, backgrounds, characters, props, etc. that need to be made in order to start shooting my animation.

    Production List

  • Characters - Teddy (Analogue) .........................................................................................................❐
    • Rig (wires) ...............................................................................................................................❐
    • Mouths, eyes (?), eyebrows ....................................................................................................❐
  • Set - Analogue ...................................................................................................................................❐
    • Background .............................................................................................................................❐
      • Millimeter paper ...........................................................................................................❐
      • Cartoon landscape .......................................................................................................❐
    • Foreground .............................................................................................................................❐
      • Rock ..............................................................................................................................❐
      • Ground ..........................................................................................................................❐
    • ★ Butterfly ..............................................................................................................................❐
      • Design ..........................................................................................................................❐
      • Concept ........................................................................................................................❐
      • Rig ................................................................................................................................❐

 ~ Butterfly Design Reference ~

 Based on: Cabbage White Butterfly

    - "Pieris rapae"

 Needs to be:

 - Clearly designed

 - Simple but eye-catching

    Assembly

    First, I traced with pencil on a paper over the puppet design concept. I then flipped it over and re-traced over the pencil drawing from the other side on thick watercolor paper.

    Next, I lined the outlines and details of Teddy in ink pen. I cut out the puppet parts and marked an 'x' on the approximate joint locations.


    Then I painted each part individually with water color. I go back over important details with ink pen after the paint dries.

Pinned Analogue Teddy Puppet

    Rigging

    Above are notes taken on joint types, references, and joint making instructions.

    Types of Cut-Out Puppet Joints

    ★ Inspos:

  • Massimo Giangrande's Paper Plane Music Video (2019), directed and animated by Gianluca Maruotti.
  • United Airlines "Dragon" Commercial (2011), directed by Jamie Caliri.
  1. No joints!
  2. Wire joints
  3. Wax joints
  4. Rivets
  5. Thread & tape joints
  6. Pocket joints
  7. Paper glue joints
    1. Consuming Spirits (2012), directed by Chris Sullivan

    How to make wire joints for Paper Puppets:

 Step 1: Create a small (pin-sized) hole in puppet segments you want hinged together. Poke hole in both at same time.

 Step 2: Thread thin wire through both holes.

 Step 3: Flip over paper puppet segments with wire and hold down wire coming out the back with finger or tape.

 Step 4: Flatten wire sticking up from puppet segments with finger and twist until it curls into itself like a spiral or loop.

 Step 5: Flip segments of puppet over to other side. Remove excess wire.

 Step 6: Repeat step 4 for remaining side with wire.

Joints Complete!

    The joint type I settled on using was spiral wire joints. Above is a test joint I made before attempting to rig the puppet.

    Above is my first and mostly successful attempt at rigging my paper puppet with spiral wire joints.

    Fixing

    After visiting and taking note of the animation studio provided by AAS College, I realized that my puppet needed a couple limbs replaced to work correctly with the top-down shooter method.

 Above are two images of the limb replacement process. The first image (left) is after the puppet's right arm was replaced. The second image (right) is after the puppet's left leg was replaced and is how the character looks in the final demo and film.