Creating the Doctor Puppet

Mar 17, 2018

2 min read

During the group discussion, we began to consider how many of each puppet needed to be made and how they'd be made. For this particular one that I'm working on, there will just be the 1 puppet [as he only exists in 3 shots] but I do need to plan how the armature will be constructed in order to be able to animate the puppet correctly.

The required movements will be: sitting, standing, walking, holding a bag, turning head around.

Below you can see the process from the mood boards and character design, right through to the testing and making of the final puppet.

Moodboard for Reference:

The Doctor's Character Design:

Above: 4 different angles of the Doctor.

Above: His scale in relation to the other characters.

Above: The Doctor in black & white and colour.

Character Description:

A very tall and extremely thin man in his late 50's. He carries a briefcase and is dressed in a dull brown, cotton suit. The Doctor's face shows years of sleep deprivation and stress; bags consume his eyes and hair loss is hard to ignore. He's a tired and slow-moving being.

Above: The Doctor in his only scene; visiting Frederick.

Making the Doctor Puppet:

Rough technical drawings to refer to when making the armature:

Inventory to collect: 1/16th inch aluminum armature wire, thin metal wire, sculpting board, milliput.

Testing: Jasmine and Elena created this armature initially for the Doctor, however the wire was too dense for movement and the glue used didn't fuse them together properly. Using this test, I made the decision to use a twisted combination of 3 wires of a lesser strenth and J.B Welding glue to join the parts together. I will also need to make the feet a lot bigger and to add a neck.

Lining Up
Comparison
Glueing Parts Together
Leaving to Dry

Above: the process of making the armature before adding sculpting board.

The Doctor
Doctor and Frederick
Doctor and Frederick

Wood PVA Glue
Wood PVA Glue

Above: Sculpting Frederick's head in addition to the Doctor's.

Strengthening the Armature
Creating Hands
Creating the Shoes
Wadding
Practicing Poses
Adding the Head

Above: Finishing the Armature.

Creating the Costume:

Using the character design, I made a quick sketch below to document the items I'd need to make - understanding that the shirt and jumper would only need to be half-made.

Making the suit:

Fabrics
Tie & Jumper
Jumper Detailing
Creating the Shirt
Combining Under-Garments
Testing
Suit Material
Painting the Shoes
Sewing Hems
Adding details.
Adding details
Creating the Jacket
Testing the Shape
Testing the Shape
Creating the Trousers
Trousers Complete

As impressed as I was by the suit I had made, there is one slight problem - the jacket does bunch up quite a lot around the armpits on the back of the body. This isn't something I can fix at this stage, but definitely something to take into consideration in future.

Above: The Doctor's armature dressed standing in Frederick's bedroom.

Adding the Eyeballs, Hair and Skin:

Myself and Gray decided to leave the plasticine part until the week before filming [during the Easter holiday] to avoid damage/dust gathering/it drying out. This leaves us more time to complete the sets during term time also. Update: Below is the outcome from the Easter holiday.

Adjustments
Kneck Joint
Adding Hair
Adding Hair
Eyeballs
Eyeballs
Adding Chin Hairs
The Finished Eyeballs

Above: Strengthening the head piece, adding hair and creating eyeballs.

Making the accessories:

Creating the Structure
Adding the Fabric
Covering Fabric Edges
Painting

Above: The Doctors bag.

Creating the Parts
Everything Glued
Details Painted

Above: After the formative assessment, I was given feedback that it wasn't entirely clear that my character was a Doctor [without the voice-over narration], so I decided to give him an additional stethoscope.