The urethane I use is thinner than latex and soaks into the foam to much if applied directly. The layer of tissue paper does two things; it keeps the liquid from soaking up and it acts as a matrix to stiffen the material. I've only just started using it, so I'm still learning what it can and can't do. I hope to use it on several of the puppets I'm planning for this project.
And thanks everyone for the kind words.

I think I understand now - it's kind of like adding papier mache over foam for marionettes, at least that's my understanding. I've never thought of using tissue paper in that way, so thanks for sharing!

Something new to learn every day on this site :D

These all look great, and I think the sheepdog is amazing.

I really love the little boar piglet, he is adorable and such a simple puppet, but very cool, the nose mech is such a great idea, simple, but very effective, it would be great to see the puppets in action and the nose mech working!! please? pretty please?? pretty please, with a cherry on top???

I love the mechanism, the pigs and the dog! I too would love to see the mech in action. I love how well you use the nap of the fur to help define the shape so well.
I am thinking of making a teeth, tongue and pallet with latex perhaps cast, perhaps over foam but now you have me thinking of different materials. Perhaps tissue with the small amount of latex I have or research your material seeings as I will be out of latex soon. Does it take colour easily? Latex colours with acrylics, I've even had a lot of success with liquid makeup for a good, long lasting, reasonably UV stable flesh colour...
Gear stuff and I look forward to seeing more

Ha, gear stuff is iPhone for GREAT stuff

Ha, gear stuff is iPhone for GREAT stuff

It took me a minute to realize you where talking about the spell check on iPhone. My Android does the same thing... don't you just hate that!

NA and ScubaSteve; the flexible urethane I'm using is a product called BJB Sc-92. BJB lists it as a primer, but it's used as a finish coating as well. It's considerably thinner in consistency than latex and goes on in much thinner coats. It has the consistency of milk. Latex is great, but the advantage of SC-92 is that it can be cleaned up with water, which means you can mix all your paints with tints or acrylic paint and use a brush to apply or you can thin it out slightly and airbrush it. It is permanent and flexible when dry and fairly tough. Unlike latex, it CANNOT be used for casting in plaster or stone molds. It adheres strongly to anything porous. I believe that it is more UV resistant than latex as well.
It's not really a replacement for latex, more of a different material altogether. But it does work with all the old latex build-up techniques; tissues, cloth, paper towels, cotton, etc.
As far as videos of the puppets goes, not sure how soon I can get to it, but maybe by the weekend, if I'm lucky. Can I upload videos to my gallery or should I do a You tube thing?
Chris

Youtube works better for videos. Not even sure I have video formats activated for the Gallery. Also that way you can embed them in a post with the YouTube tag.  Just copy then past the URL to the video in the box that pops up when you click on the YT icon.

Just double checked and actually I do have some of the more common video formats like mp4, mpeg, avi ect activated but they do eat up a lot of the space on the server since unlike Youtube compression and such is not handled very well.  Also I don't have any players integrated into the Gallery system so all you can really do then is download them. 

You Tube it is and thanks for the info.

Well, I got to do some airbrushing on my snakey guy and he's almost finished (maybe it's a she?). The tongue and fangs are temporary, I think, until I can do something a little more finished.

I used a felt pen to delineate major lines. I had planned to do more of this, but once I started getting a feel for how fleece takes paint, I felt that it was just as easy to do it with an airbrush.

I used a fabric paint but mixed it with the urethane I've been using for the teeth, etc. It seems to have made a difference. Hopefully, the pain will be more permanent?

Doing the linework with the airbrush over uneven surfaces was a bit hairy at times. I found I had to drag the airbrush across the fleece itself to get a relatively sharp line.

I simplified the pattern much more than I thought I would, simply because I was finding that the fleece wouldn't hold the detail as much as I had hoped.
But I'm still happy with the overall effect. This was a puppet that I really didn't have much of a plan for when I started it and now I've got a new character, Sebastian the Cyclopean Asp!

Hope to get this one finished in the next day or two, just as soon as I decide what to use for the teeth and tongue.
Chris

Wow! He looks really great. For being simplified that looks like an awful lot of detail.

Great air brushing. Love the detail.

Thanks guys. I'm starting to get more excited about this project with every puppet. After redoing the dog, I decided to go through some of my old stuff and found these two bear heads;

One is a puppet with a snout mech and the other is a suit head with opening mouth that I'll redo as a puppet head. Should be fun!