Robo Kid Puppet

So recently I have been asked to be part of a fun film project. It is a production by a group of BYU film students. My role not surprising is puppet builder/puppeteer. The puppeteer part has me a little worried, because I'm a little rusty, however I'm up for it!

I'm using a kit I bought at a local craft to age the metal finish and dull down some of the silver metal paint. The director wanted the eyes to be giant metal nuts, so I took a silicone mold of the biggest nuts I could find, and then cast them in a hard plastic resin.

I had to polish every inch of the hard dense foam with a dremel tool to get the surface of the foam to be less sponge looking. Then I smoothed out the tooling marks by adding a little heat.

The welding around the eyes is painted hot glue.


I have really enjoyed working on this puppet, because I haven't had to sew anything. It's been a nice change of pace to paint the foam. The results are a little more instant, and if I don't like the way a color came out I just paint over it easy as you please. The puppet has been a delightful challenge, learning to make foam look like metal. I've been very satisfied with the results, though I still have a long way to go.