Need help with background scenery for puppets in a car

[baer77]

Hi everyone!  I'm new here and let me say how happy I am that I found this amazing forum!  You are all so ridiculously talented!!!  I am GREEN when it comes to puppets!  I have no experience whatsoever but I am attempting to film a puppet show!  It's kind of a music video.  Anyway, in one scene, two puppets are in a car, a cab driver in the front and a passenger in the back.  It will probably be shot from the side, so you can see both.  Does anyone have any ideas of what I could do so it looks like the car is moving?  Like maybe have something moving in the background buy what?  I doesn't have to look totally perfect.  If it looked a little chessy or obviously fake, that's ok, maybe funnier even.  Any ideas would be greatly appreciated and I look forward from learning from all you experts!

[Monkey]

How about a rolling picture. you use two spinles on each end of the set and roll one while the other comes unrolled, passing a picture of moving trees and houses behind the car. If  I can find my diagram for this I will post it here so it will be more clear.- Steve

[dacostasr]

Welcome to the Forum.  Get someone to drive you around with your video camera pointing out the side window...I saw a tutorial online for green screening where someone did that and then green screeened himself running in front of it.  It looked pretty good...and funny.

Dennis

[Abdolos]

Paint some trees and houses on separate pieces of cardboard.  Maybe add some sticks to handle them.  Get "puppeteers" to hold them up and run by behind your stationary car.  Have them run around behind the camera so they can make another pass.  It doesn't get any simpler than that. 
Oh, don't forget sound effects!  The sound of a motor running and objects whooshing by are an important part of the illusion of movement you're going for.

[Billy D. Fuller]

It would be neat if you could incorporate Shadow puppetry into the back drop scenery. It would be a lot of work but would show two types of puppetry being used.

Billy D.

[miguel]

  hey,    to P&S

Ask to Titere. She is really good in drawing and background!

[baer77]

WoW!  Thanks everyone, these are all great ideas!  I am thinking I like the idea of filming outside a car window.  I actually thought about this before!  I think it would look funny.  My only concern is, how in the world do you green screen???

[Chris Arveson]

My only concern is, how in the world do you green screen???

Ann, this YouTube video is a great start for understanding green screen work. Start with this, and continue in his series. I think that most of the video editing software packages include chromakey, which is what green screen is all about.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?&lt;object width=&quot;384&quot; height=&quot;313&quot;&gt;&lt;param name=&quot;movie&quot; value=&quot;http://www.youtube.com/v/w6brdwY-dvU&amp;hl=en_US&amp;fs=1&quot;&gt;&lt;/param&gt;&lt;param name=&quot;allowFullScreen&quot; value=&quot;true&quot;&gt;&lt;/param&gt;&lt;param name=&quot;allowscriptaccess&quot; value=&quot;always&quot;&gt;&lt;/param&gt;&lt;embed src=&quot;http://www.youtube.com/v/w6brdwY-dvU&amp;hl=en_US&amp;fs=1&quot; type=&quot;application/x-shockwave-flash&quot; width=&quot;384&quot; height=&quot;313&quot; allowscriptaccess=&quot;always&quot; allowfullscreen=&quot;true&quot;&gt;&lt;/embed&gt;&lt;/object&gt;" target="youtube">YouTube Video</a>

[baer77]

Thanks Chris!  Very informative!  I'm pretty sure I have the software b/c I have a MAC and I think it came with some pretty good video editing software already!  I am so excited!  I got lots of supplies last night at Dollar Tree of all places!

[Shawn Sorrell]

Dollar Tree is always a good source for puppet making.  Maybe we should have a Dollar Tree puppet making challenge.

[DrPuppet]

The most low tech way I have done it is to buy a painters drop cloth and cut it in half or thirds depending on the size. I sewed it to geter to make a really long canvis. Then sewed the end to make a big tube after I painted it. Get two two inch dowel rods and screw them to a platform and stretch the canvas over them. Then just attach som handels on the bottom so you can move it around. Usually only take two people. It will rotate 360 degrees so the car appears to move on an endless loop. then just some midground cars or trees as others suggest to break it up. Its much easier than it sounds.