When I filmed the unboxing, I was concerned at the amount of Nylafleece™ that was sent with the kit. The piece of fleece was 1 yard x 1 yard (90x90cm). Given that I wanted to use the same fleece to make features such as ears, eyestalks, as well as allowing for the possibility of mistakes in cutting the pattern, it didn’t feel like enough fabric at first glance.
Even laying the pattern out according to the layout directions in the instruction booklet- the pattern got too close to the machine edge. I was able to adjust the layout so that I was comfortable with the distance of the pattern pieces from the machine edge, but there was very little fleece leftover for all the add ons I want to do with this character.
Nylafleece with an attempt at laying out the pattern drawn on it.
After preparing the fleece pattern, I also took the opportunity to prepare the arm sleeve using the provided stretch satin, as well as the rod pockets in duck cloth. I normally use a dance fabric like lycra because it is more stretchy than the provided satin, and it slides onto the arm with ease. Laying out, and sewing these pieces was straight forward, but as soon as I cut the satin out, it started to fray really badly around the edges. I decided to oversew the raw edge using a zig zag stitch even though this was not in the instructions. The arm sleeve and rod pockets are the only parts of this puppet I intend to sew on the sewing machine. The rest of the puppet will be handsewn.
My design for this puppet is to build an Alien character as I don’t have an alien in my puppet collection, plus I was trying to work out what to do with Ocean blue fleece. I also want to challenge myself with this puppet, by incorporating an eye mechanism that I have admired for years, as well as try to incorporate some foam patterning to build up the base shape.
In terms of character, this yet un-named alien is friendly, and is obsessed with things that smell nice like fresh baked cookies, flowers, perfume. On it’s planet- smell is the basis of their economy. So this character is looking for nice smells to take back to it’s planet for trade.
The mechanism is a closing eye- and to add to the challenge, I want to put it up on stalks above the head! I figured out the layers of the mechanism while watching the character of Polly in Muppets Treasure Island. I am still trying to figure out if the trigger for the eye mech will be inside the head, or down on the arm rod for the puppet, but that is a decision for down the road.
My design for the Alien puppet using the Hubbub puppet pattern
The Coronavirus (Covid-19) Pandemic has encouraged everyone to find alternative ways to be creative. This is no different in the puppet world. Since it is not currently safe to hold a workshop to teach how to build a puppet, there is a rising trend of well known puppet-makers teaming with suppliers to send out puppet making kits that contain everything someone needs to make a foam hand puppet. During November 2020, two US based puppet company’s released puppet kits- Puppet Pelts, and Monkey Boys Productions.
The Puppet Pelts kit- known as the Puppet Makers Workshop contains everything required to build a hand and rod puppet including contact cement, which meant it cannot be shipped overseas. Here is a picture from their website of what is in the box-
List of supplies in the Puppet Pelts kit
The other company is Monkey Boys Productions based in Pennsylvania USA. They released 4 kits called Flick, Splat, Hubbub and Yawp. The difference between the two kits was that the Monkey Boys kits contain everything except 6 items- scissors, glue, fabric marker, chalk, sewing machine, and wire for arm rods. This meant that the kit could be shipped to me in Australia. Another difference is that the Monkey Boys kit does not come with a 5 session video workshop, but it does come with an instruction book, and video tutorials where required.
You can see and order the kits from the Monkey Boys online store
I ordered the Hubbub kit because I liked the interesting head shape, and as a puppet making teacher, I am interested in how puppet kits are put together so that people who don’t have access to the best quality supplies, can access them. I filmed an unboxing of the kit to record what you get in the Monkey Boys Pro Puppet Kit known as Hubbub.
I intend to share this puppet making journey here on my blog as I turn the Monkey Boys Kit into an Alien character.
Over the last few weeks, I have been involved in many video conferencing calls for both my teaching world and my puppetry world. When I have used Zoom, I have used their virtual background feature, and it works really well to a point. The tricky part is if I want to show the other people in the call an object, or even play with a puppet, the virtual background without the green screen option cannot include the object beside me such as a puppet on my arm.
My first thought was, can I use a substitute fabric as a green screen/ chroma key background? I wanted to focus on using the materials I had at home that are a solid colour. I started out exploring bed sheets since they are light to hang up. I had one that is a blue grey colour, and the other was a pale green. While setting up for filming, my new woven polyproplene green screen that I had purchased on Amazon arrived, so now I could compare the effects.
Phone filming setup with zoom running on the computer in the background
Blue bed sheet covering my book case
Green bed sheet covering the book case
Stylus tipped pen to control my watch
Apple Watch app controlling the phone camera
Results from the experiment
In Zoom, I got best results from using the green bed sheet and the commercial green screen without any additional lighting apart from the ceiling downlights.
In editing using Adobe Premiere Pro- I got the cleanest background removal results from the professional green screen.
If I was to do the experiment again, I want to see what would happen if I added lights to the sheet/ screen only to even out the colour difference across the surface. I would also iron or smooth out the surface to see if the background removal was more successful.
A frog once said in a TEDx Talk, “If necessity is mother of invention, then creativity is the father”. Given the whole world has been isolated by the COVID 19 pandemic, puppeteers are trying to find ways to reach their audiences remotely. There is a lot of discussion in the puppetry community about how to adapt video conferencing and streaming technology to puppetry.
Over the last 5 years, I have been learning the art of television and film puppetry from 2 amazing gentlemen who I am honoured to call my mentors- Noel MacNeal and Peter Linz. One of the challenges I have faced practising my puppetry skills at home, is recording video of my puppets being puppets. I started out using my webcamera, but it could not record what the puppet was doing. If I use my phone or iPad as the camera, either the image on the screen looks like a mirror, or I can’t see the image on screen. In both of those situations, I don’t know if the puppet looks right for the audience.
I have assembled my own monitor puppetry kit over the last 5 years with a Sony Handycam, a small flat screen tv which has evolved into a professional 7 inch field monitor as my puppetry monitor, tripod and cables. Even though this setup is in an old suitcase with wheels. it’s very difficult to move around, and I have to download and edit the footage afterwards. This means that the puppet cannot interact live with an audience, or another puppet that is not in the same room. I haven’t been able to acquire the equipment required to live stream from the Handycam to any of the streaming platforms like Facebook live or Zoom yet.
Monitor Puppetry kit with tripod, screen, camera, cables, HDMI Splitter
However, on April 14, 2020, my puppetry mentor Peter Linz, shared this photo and a New York Times article on how Elmo’s Playdate was filmed on his Instagram account. I looked at the equipment he was using. It was his mobile phone, linked to his field monitor. The phone was recording the performance, yet he could see what his character Ernie was doing on the monitor. By looking at the cables coming out of the phone in the photo, I immediately worked out I could adapt the equipment I have at home! It was such a creative, innovative solution to the problem!
Peter Linz performing Ernie for Elmo’s Playdate. Photo Credit Aria Linz
So this is how I have been able to reverse engineer the setup. Please note that this setup is for iPhone (I have a standard iPhone 11).
Well, it is the early morning of World Puppetry Day 2020. The world is currently facing a serious pandemic, but it is important to find sparks of joy. One of my sparks of joy is that I have been blessed to meet a young drama teacher, who has become my puppetry apprentice. Over the last 2.5 years since I met him in 2017 at a Professional Development workshop I was leading, Pete Davidson’s puppetry career has sprouted wings, and he is now soaring. Today, he launched his very own puppetry podcast- Talking Sock and I am one of the first guests!
It is so wonderful to now be able to hear and share the voices of Australian Puppetry. I follow many puppetry podcasts, but this is the first Australian puppet podcast!
As a child, one of the puppets that I encountered, and it left a significant impression on me, was the Karakuri dolls on display in the foyer of Questacon- the National Science and Technology Centre in Canberra, Australia. The Karakuri dolls were a bicentennial gift from Japan to Australia in 1988. Two identical dolls were given- one with a full costume, and a second without the costume so that visitors to the centre could see how the doll works. I loved pressing the button and watching the uncostumed doll dance and transform into the demon character. I remember the traditional Japanese music was very hypnotising.
Since seeing the dolls perform as a child, seeing the costumed one again during my visit to Questacon in July was very nostalgic. The dolls have performed so often for visitors, that they both required extensive restoration. Sadly, the Karakuri doll on display is currently not moving, but it was wonderful to encounter a significant puppet from my childhood.
Restored Karakuri doll on displayRestored Karakuri on display.
I am often asked, how did I get into the world of puppetry? For me, I am the first in my family to be actively involved in the puppet world, but I did grow up around puppets. I was a child of the 1980’s, and I was taken to lots of live puppet theatre by my mother and grandmother, puppet shows were frequently performed at my school, and the most influential source on me was were puppets on television twice a day. I grew up with Sesame Street, The Muppet Show, The Sooty Show, stop motion presentations of Paddington Bear, and Wind in the Willows, and the most important puppet in Australian television history, Mr Squiggle and Friends. During 2019, Mr Squiggle and Friends because of their significance to Australian culture, have been depicted on actual circulating Australian coins as well as in a collector’s set to celebrate the 60th Anniversary of Mr Squiggle and Friends. To celebrate the anniversary, the puppets from Mr Squiggle and Friends, as well as related materials have gone on display at the Royal Australian Mint in Canberra.
From 1959, only three years after television arrived in Australia, Mr Squiggle, a marionette puppet that could actually draw using a pencil for his nose on camera, would entertain children like me for over 40 years. His friends were Rocket, Blackboard, Bill Steamshovel, Gus the Snail, and a human presenter. Mr Squiggle lived on the moon at 93 Crater Crescent, and used Rocket as his transport to Earth, and he loved to transform squiggles drawn by viewers and sent into the show into illustrations. Mr Squiggle and Friends was created and puppeteered by one man, Norman Hetherington (1921-2010).
I loved the show a great deal, not because the characters were puppets, it was because the storytelling was fun and interesting. Mr Squiggle drew his pictures so that the image was upside down, and as a child, I loved trying to work out what the picture would be before the pink cardboard was turned around so that the image would be right side up. Each image also had a story about it that Mr Squiggle would tell to his human friend. Quite often, once the picture had been finished, Mr Squiggle would add more lines and shapes to it, and ask his human friend to turn the picture around again, a whole new picture would emerge. I also liked how naughty Rocket could be, Rocket never spoke, he used movement and sounds to convey his attitude, and Blackboard could be downright rude with his signature “Hurry Up!”.
The Puppets
Mr Squiggle
Mr Squiggle was a marionette with blinking eyes, and the ability to extend his neck out of his body so that his pencil nose could reach all areas of the drawing board. When I first got to see the Mr Squiggle puppet at the 50 years of Television exhibition in 2009, I finally worked out what the pencil “lead” in his nose was made from- it was a stick of artist charcoal, but Mr Squiggle’s “lead” evolved over the years.
When ever I saw Mr Squiggle draw, his human presenter would hold his hand. Thinking about how the puppet was performed from above, and that his neck extended, I have wondered if the human presenter by holding the puppet’s hand, was actually helping to keep the puppet’s body grounded, allowing the neck to move in and out.
Mr Squiggle in 2019Miss H with Mr Squiggle at the Australian Mint
Bill the Steamshovel
Bill the Steamshovel was another marionette puppet, who loved to eat concrete crunchies and blow smoke as he talked. The smoke was baby powder blown through tubing that ran from off camera, into the body, and along the puppet’s neck. Most of his construction was from foam, and I loved listening to his riddles!
Sadly, only the head and neck of Bill Steamshovel was on display at the Australian Mint.
Head and neck of Bill Steamshovel
Rocket
Rocket was Mr Squiggle’s mode of transport from his home at 93 Crater Crescent the Moon, to visit his friends on Earth. Rocket was a marionette with a hole in the front so that Mr Squiggle’s pencil could stick out. Rocket had no speaking voice, and would quite often use his whistle and/or party blower to communicate impatience akin to a child sticking their tongue out to be rude. The whole front of Rocket would swing down to allow for Mr Squiggle, with assistance from his human companion to get in and out. Once loaded, and with the front door closed over the nose, Mr Squiggle and Rocket would be pulled out of the shot with a blast of powder, then cut to an animated representation of Mr Squiggle returning home through space.
Looking at the Rocket puppet, it was really interesting to see that the puppet was mostly made of wood, and several details on the front, were actually sections of upholstery foam. The rivets were just painted on, yet they looked very real on camera.
Mr Squiggle and Rocket
Gus the Snail
Gus was the only hand puppet on the show. Gus is a very confident, assertive character, to point were for me, I did not like his character because of his bossy, self centred nature. Instead of a shell, Gus had a TV set on his back. I remember how much Gus liked knock knock jokes.
Gus the Snail
Blackboard
Blackboard was the easel upon which Mr Squiggle drew squiggles for 40 years. Another marionette puppet, made of wood, with rope legs connected to red shoes, Blackboard was a very grumpy character. He only had one eye that could open, and his mouth would open and close when a squiggle was not in the way. Quite often the audience would hear Blackboard’s signature “Hmpf,” or “Hurry up”, but the puppet was not moving because a squiggle was sitting on the two nails.
Blackboard is such an iconic character, that I spotted a sandwich sign outside a coffee shop in Canberra on my way to the Royal Australian Mint, to see the Mr Squiggle exhibition that had been decorated as Blackboard with one eye open.
Miss H with the Blackboard puppetRepresentation of Blackboard seen outside a coffee shop in Canberra
The exhibition at the Royal Australian Mint
A small display of the Mr Squiggle and Friends puppets, as well as scripts, actual squiggles, and a painting of Mr Squiggle and his human creator, Norman Hetherington was in the central section of the Royal Australian Mint exhibition gallery on the second floor.
An actual squiggle from the Mr Squiggle TV show.
The exhibition was free to the public, and it was lovely to see the puppets, except I am worried that the puppets don’t look like puppets anymore. So much work has been done to them to make it possible for them to be displayed. All the strings have been removed, and Mr Squiggle’s hat has been changed and twisted so that he looks like the drawings of Mr Squiggle in the picture books, colouring books, and the coin album. The original hat concealed the rod that went from Mr Squiggle’s head all the way up to the controller.
I was disappointed that there were no video monitors in the exhibition space showing episodes or segments of Mr Squiggle and Friends. The show has been off the air since 1999, so the children coming to see Mr Squiggle had no point of reference to understand what their parents or grandparents were explaining of their childhood friend.
Today was a really special day. A friend of mine who is a cast member of the Jim Henson Company’s show Puppet Up, invited me to join a tour he was running of the Jim Henson Company lot in LA. The main courtyard is very relaxing and beautiful. It has an air of an European village with outdoor tables, planter boxes of flowers, and close buildings. The studio was built by Charlie Chaplin in 1918, and there are references to Charlie Chaplin everywhere, including the statue of Kermit the Frog standing on the top of the gate dressed as Charlie Chaplin’s signature character- the Little Tramp.
We visited the reception area where I got to hold a real Emmy award, the Barn where the Creature Shop used to be housed, the Henson Screening room, and the Charlie Chaplin Soundstage where the tour group was given a demonstration of monitor puppetry. After the tour group left, I was given the opportunity to have a go at the monitor puppetry on the soundstage, using a REAL Henson made puppet! I am very grateful to my friend for allowing me to tag along on the tour and to have a go at the monitor puppetry!
With Lucy Green at the Company bench
Holding the Emmy won by Muppets Tonight in 1998
I found another Skesis from the Dark Crystal!
Jim Henson Company reception
Head from Where the Wild Things Are.
Standing beneath the Kermit statue
Standing outside the Barn- with a Dinosaur.
Henson Recording Studio
Charlie Chaplin's Little tramp shoe prints
Charlie Chaplins signature
Charlie Chaplin Sound Stage
Demonstration of monitor puppetry on the Charlie Chaplin Sound Stage
Me with DJ Panda, star of Puppet Up and Jim Henson Company podcast
Signage for Women's restroom.
Signage for Gentleman's restroom
Charlie Chaplin mural on the outside of the Henson company lot
Kermit the Frog as the Little Tramp.
Day 11, Tuesday 11 June 2019
Today’s adventure was taking the Warner Bros Studio Deluxe tour. Starting at 10am, the tour started in the Deluxe screening room which had very nice pastries and beverages for the guests. Arranged next to the wall were costumes from the main characters of the TV show Friends. After a brief video about the studio, and meeting our tour guide Thom, we boarded our own tram and started driving through the studio starting with the backlot jungle area. Highlight for me in this area was the now empty lagoon as it was the location where Kermit the Frog sang the Rainbow Connection at the beginning of the original Muppet Movie 40 years ago.
After moving from the jungle area, the tour moved to the Midwest Street and again, it was a place that had special significance for me as a puppet maker and fan of the Muppets. It was the shooting location for the song Life’s a Happy Song from the movie The Muppets (2011).
Lagoon where Rainbow Connection was filmed in the original Muppet Movie.
Lagoon where Rainbow Connection was filmed in the original Muppet Movie.
Lagoon where Rainbow Connection was filmed in the original Muppet Movie.
Walter and Gary Trick or Treated at this door in the Muppets Movie (2011)
Life's a Happy Song from the Muppets (2011) movie was filmed here.
Life's a Happy Song from the Muppets (2011) movie was filmed here.
Life's a Happy Song from the Muppets (2011) movie was filmed here.
Life's a Happy Song from the Muppets (2011) movie was filmed here.
Life's a Happy Song from the Muppets (2011) movie was filmed here.
Backlot at Warner Bros Studio
Warner Bros water tower
Original Aquaman costume
Fireplace from Privett Drive- Harry Potter and the Philospher's Stone.
Acceptance letter to Hogwarts.
Harry Potter's wand
Dumbledore's Army list.
Costumes of Tom Riddle
Professor McGonagall's update robes.
Quidditch set
Bat Bike
Batmobile
Batmobile
Originial Michael Keaton Batmobile
Bat signal
Original Bat mobile
Tumbler
Batmobile
Batmobile
Batman statue
Bat signal
Michael Keaton Bat Cowl
My Fair Lady costume
Christian Bale Bat cowl
One of my favourite Warner Bros TV shows was the West Wing and it was filmed at the LA Warner Bros Studio! I got to see Stage 29 where the main set was located, but during the tour of the property warehouse, I got to sit at the President’s desk from the show, as well as find various pieces of set decorating and props from the show!
Sitting at the President's desk from West Wing
Sitting at the President's desk from West Wing.
Filming location for West Wing Season 7.
Emmy Award for West Wing
Paintings used in the West Wing
The replica of the Resolute desk from the West Wing
Set decoration from the West Wing
Set decoration from the West Wing
Replica of the President's Podium
Props for American political dramas
Props from the West Wing.
I highly recommend the Warner Bros Deluxe tour- you get to see much more than the regular tour, as well as touch things, go inside more buildings, and there is the delicious lunch in the Warner Bros Commissary Fine Dining Room. I do recommend bringing small snacks for the morning and afternoon break as there is no opportunity to purchase snacks while on the tour.
Day 12- Wednesday 12 June 2019
Today was my travel day home to Australia. Fortunately, the wifi in the hotel meant I could wait in the Lobby until the taxi picked me up in the late afternoon to take me to the airport. After treating myself to new noise cancelling headphones, I enjoyed a light meal in the One World Alliance Lounge. Once I boarded my QANTAS Business Class flight, I fell asleep virtually immediately, and slept for about 6 hours straight.
It has been a magical holiday- I am so grateful to my puppet friends in the USA for the kindness and generosity they shared with me that made it magical.
The building session was once again the first session of the day. Our major goal was to completely finish assembling all the fur sections and ideally have our puppets sitting on stands. Once I had the fur sections ready for machine sewing, the group moved onto making the hand assemblies, cutting out the stiffened felt ear shapes, and selecting the fleece for the eyelids. I chose a cream/ tan fleece for my dog’s eyelids as Australian Cattle dogs typically have a tan coloured spot on their face right above their eyes. I did acheive my goal of graduating to a puppet stand before the end of the building session.
Puppet dog ready for grooming tomorrow!One assembled puppet dog ready for grooming on it’s stand.
Highlight of the morning session was during the break. My performing teacher found me in the corridor, and showed me that the interview we had both given the reporter the day before, had been published online! It was really exciting to appear in the same article as my dear teacher, and I had been waiting the previous day for the newspaper photographer to come and take my picture, but the photographer had taken a lovely picture of me while I was performing with my friend from North Queensland, Ros Campbell from Wild Puppets. Here is the article.
The physical newspaper that my interview appeared in.
The performing session for the advanced group was really interesting as the group got to experiment with using intense emotions and the whole depth of the frame. This was followed by a very challenging activity of creating our own scene where the audience has to work out who, what, when, where, why from what the characters are performing on the screen. My highlight of the session was being able to return to an exercise I had last tried in 2015- working with blank scripts. I didn’t quite find the character development I was looking for where after multiple run throughs with feedback, I had gotten to the point where I was a character, but it was wonderful to come back to this exercise after 4 years.
The evening was spent working with my performance partner Ros working on the script for the big show, and finishing making the ears. I wish I had brought my bag of sewing cottons with me from Australia. It was tricky catching up on homework, without sufficient supplies back at the hotel.
Day 8, Saturday June 8 2019
Today is the last day of Beyond the Sock 2019. It is also known as mega Saturday as the puppets have to be finished, performances honed, and the whole thing ends with the big show that night. My goal for the day was to have my puppet finished by lunchtime so I could use it in the afternoon studio session. The big excitement of the whole week was learning how to trim furry puppets using a device called a Flowbee. The Flowbee is a device connected to a vacuum cleaner that trims hair and fur to a consistent length. The vacuum helps manage the trimmings. I have heard about the use of Flowbee’s in puppet making for many years, but I had never used one myself personally.
The rest of the session was a sprint to finish all parts of the puppet. I still had to add the ears, the arms, the tongue, add the eyelids, eyeliner and pupils of the eyes, and then the trickiest part, installing the eyes on the puppet so that the character appears. I did achieve my goal, my puppet dog Jill, was the first one out of the build room, and being performed with that afternoon.
The performance session was time to work on rehearsing the sketches for that night, as well as continuing to perform and playback the 5 minute scenes we had been practising all week. Playback and feedback is always the most anxiety inducing part of the sessions for me. I can see all my mistakes, and even though the feedback is always given kindly, I always feel uncomfortable. The unfortunate part about playback this year, was that we never really got to go back and redo the scene to implement the notes and see if there was any improvement.
Every year, at the end of the big show, is the whole group performance. This year, our song was an adaption of a popular song that was rewritten to focus on different kinds of dogs. Various attendees got to have a line in the song, and the whole group joined in with the chorus. What was new for me, was that the whole group was brought together in the morning to pre-record the vocals. This meant that the advanced group lost 30 minutes of build time. Prerecording the song, did take some of the stress out of the final night, all we had to remember was the choreography, even though there was some confusion as to the number of bounces and right lefts. The performance night was fun as always. Most attendees had a song, poem, or spoken word piece. I got to perform with fellow Australian Ros Campbell on her own piece about translating Aussie Slang into a form of words that the Americans could understand.
Inserting the doll joint backings into the arms.
Trimming the fur
Positioning the eyes.
Positioning the eyes
Finished!
Showtime!
Performing with Ros Campbell of Wild Puppets Queensland.
Performing with Ros Campbell of Wild Puppets Queensland.
Performing with Ros Campbell of Wild Puppets Queensland.
Performing with Ros Campbell of Wild Puppets Queensland.
Day 9, Sunday June 9 2019
Today was my travel day from Texas to Los Angeles. The plane was amazing! For the first time in my life, I got to turn left as I boarded the plane, instead of turning right. The new American Airlines plane Business class was superb! It was almost like having my own suite! So many cubby holes to store things, a giant screen to watch things on, couldn’t see another passenger! It was like a dream!
