Swedish Puppets

Coming along, coming along...

2007-09-05T16:05:00.000-07:00

Oh my, how time flies. It's been a long time, been buzy with other stuff. But now, finally i have almost finished my green puppet. I'm hopefully going to start working on puppets lots more now.

Puppet Design in Photoshop

2006-11-05T09:13:00.000-08:00

When starting a new puppet it’s good to make a drawing of your ideas before you begin to build. Perhaps you’d like to try out some charachter designs, changing hair, placement of eyes, nose etc. Why not use your computer for this. You can get great results using photoshop and illustrator. Here’s
a link i found that got me started doing this. It shows indepth how you can youse photoshop to add depth, textures and other usefull things to your drawings and photos. The above picture is my puppet Eric that i made from the glorified sockpuppet-pattern, made into a drawing in photoshop. I could have made something completely new but chose to do this puppet just to show what you can do. I’ll be doing a complete tutorial on how i did this in the near future, so stay tuned…

The green monster is coming along

2006-10-04T13:57:00.000-07:00

Today i attached the body and arms. The next thing to do now is to make a foam-body and some hands. The neck is a bit too wide, in my opinion. I'll remember that for the next puppet.

Green monster part II

2006-10-03T14:16:00.000-07:00

A little progress today. I made the mouthplates with a budget-handhugger, made a necksleeve and trimmed down the excess furr on the face. I really like the look of the trimmed furr. Next move now is to design a body. I haven't done any designs on this puppet before i started. I thought i'd develop the puppet as i go along, and see what happens. I'm not really good at drawing so designing on the go works better for me. I really look forward to build the charachter of this puppet with facial features.
To be continued...

Cheapo handhugger

2006-10-03T09:19:00.000-07:00

I tried to make a very cheap version of the handhugger for the green puppet i am working on now. It's made from duct-tape and foam. Very easy construction. If you want to make one of your own you should be able to figure it out by looking at my picture. I have attached it to the puppet and it actually works really well and fits right in the hand. The moutplate is made from craft-foam sheets. It's really sturdy and holds up well.

Oh, these money issues...

2006-10-02T18:50:00.000-07:00

I was going to finish the green little fella a few weeks ago, then suddenly financial issues put a stop to that. Gaah, i'm frustrated. Anyway, i think i can go and buy the materials i need this week to finish it. For those of you waiting for the finished puppet to show up here, please be patient. Soon, my friends, soon ;)

There's a new blog in town; puppetbuzz.com
I don't know much about it, but i did get an email from Pasha at projectpuppet.com. Looks like it can become an interesting site with puppetry news, rescourses etc.

Projectpuppet.com is at it again

2006-09-10T16:07:00.000-07:00

This has probably not gone by unnoticed in the puppetry community online, but i'll add it anyway. Projectpuppet.com has a new pattern out in their simple series. It's the roly pattern, which is a round head-pattern. It comes with outer skin-pattern and a foambase pattern.

This is great news for people just starting out building puppets. These puppets go together really quick, providing you have the skills of sewing, glueing etc etc.
I wish these guys were around when i first started to learn how to build puppets.

New puppet in the making

2006-09-07T06:05:00.000-07:00

Well, the summer is over, and a new season is upon us. So i thought i'd start the new season with making a new puppet. It will be a green friendly monster when finished. I started out building the head this morning and finished in 5 hours. The only thing missing is inserting the mouthplates and a neck. That i will do tomorrow. Next week i will make a body.

The Gobo Fraggle-puppet i mentioned earlier will also be done soon (i hope). But for now i really want to get some original charachters done.
Well, i'll post some more when i got more to update.

Gobo Fraggle 1st Try

2006-07-05T17:02:00.000-07:00

I decided to try and build a replica of Gobo Fraggle. I started with this rough trial-and-error-head. It's just for me to see if it works out. Some minor adjustments might be needed, especially in the moutplate. Also, the foam i used is slightly too weak. It's the first foam i ever bought about 4 years ago. it's just regular upholstry-foam 1cm thickness. I am going to order some reticulated foam in a month or two and try to build gobo out of that instead.
He will also be a bit larger than i designed this head. Here are some pics:

I also did a little experiment in photoshop to visualize it better:

I'll dye some antronfleece in the next week or 2 and start off with fleece covering.

The 10 Finalists

2006-06-24T15:37:00.000-07:00

...of the Sockpuppet Contest are revealed. I was lucky to make it in those 10. As they are revealed i can finally show my entry here. this is what he looks like:

His name is Eric. If you want to vote on him, or any of the other awesome contestants, please visit the competition site.

Entry submitted

2006-05-28T10:56:00.000-07:00

I have now submitted my photos to the glorified sock-puppet competition. Now we just wait and see what happens ;)
When the competition is settled i will post some pics of the puppet.

Entering the contest

2006-05-23T14:23:00.000-07:00

So this is my first post for my newly created blog. Who am i? I am Anders, just a regular guy from sweden who likes to build puppets. I started out a few years ago. I have always been a fan of the muppets, and always wanted my own setup of the muppet-puppets. Realizing that would never come true i decided to learn how to start building my own. So here i am now, still learning. I think you can never stop learning no matter how good you get at what you are doing.
Anyway, i noticed this contest being held at the projectpuppet site. So i thought i'd enter just for the fun of it. I am working on a simple puppet at the moment, but because the competition is not finished yet i can't publish any pictures right now. I have created the head and body and connected them to eachother. Tomorrow i will add the arms and begin working on charachter features. I will ofcourse add pics ones the contest has ended.