I'm thinking of making a fullbody puppet similar to Sweetums or Thog from the Muppets. Making the suit itself shouldn't be too hard, just requiring a lot of work but the hard part would be making it's head. I don't know how I should construct the head so you can open it's mouth by using your right hand (or left for those are left-handed) for when the character is talking.
Do you guys have any ideas how to do it? It would be great if you have some blueprints of the mechanism, it would make it much easier to construct than just using words.

And a minor detail I would ask, wherever it is a regular hand puppet or a full Body puppet, does anyone know how to make a mechanism for a character to raise their eyebrows (like Sweetums or Animal)?

If you watch older shows like New Zoo Review or Pufnstuf, the mouth is almost "springy", where body movements make the mouth go up and down. In the case of New Zoo Review, for closeups, the right arm of the costume swung free and the mouth was opened and closed with the right arm in some sort of pocket in the mouth...

With a head this large, the eyes could probably be operated with internal levers...


Thanks

This is a pretty wide stretch but think about how a door handle works on like a commercial building where you push down on it on one side and it also moves on the other side. If you had two of those handles on the door pointing in at each other and covered them with fur they would look like eyebrows that move up and down when moved the handles on the other side. Maybe this gives a better idea of what I am talking about.
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?urhl6acGXkA" target="youtube">YouTube Video</a>

Sometimes instead of the action you see above the eyebrows are mounted on a post and it moves up and down in a slot in the head.

Animal has it right. If you want to operate the mouth with your one arm then you create a dummy one on the puppet. It is normally strung to the chine or upper chest so that it has some movement and does not just hang to the side.

Sorry not a lot of diagrams of this out there.

This is a great DVD on how to make moving mechs.  It includes eyebrows.  http://www.playsoup.com/store/video10.htm

Julie

The DVD Julie is recommending is terrific for blinking eyes and moving eyebrows

As for the suits, I remember seeing a "behind the scenes" on how the Gorgs were operated for Fraggle Rock. They had mechanical heads so a puppeteer could control the mouth. Big Bird, on the other hand, was designed with a stuffed arm so the puppeteer could reach up to move the mouth.

Best of luck on that building endeavor!

This is a great DVD on how to make moving mechs.  It includes eyebrows.  http://www.playsoup.com/store/video10.htm

Julie

I have the first one but never got around to getting volume 2&3.... Thumbs up! on the first DVD though.

I am also looking into making a full bodied puppet for this semester. I was wondering what to make the body out of? I am doing it big bird style so i already know how to do the head

I've seen and made bodies in several different ways. One is to make the body out of closed cell high dense foam.

You can also make the body out of the softer open cell foam like used in heads and then sandwich it between two layers of the mesh athletic fabric. This actually works pretty well and allows you to wash the body if you want. When you do this you might have to use plastic tubing or boning inserted into the mid section to hold out the shape of the body.

Some characters are simply a fur suite  if you don't need an exaggerated shape.

Thank you so much Shawn. that is very helpful. i'm going to look into those foams and if the price is right I will give it a try. I have a mascot costume from a place I use to work so if all else fails I can trace a pattern from that and modify it.

This is a good book! It is out of print but I found it here

http://www.ibexa.com/V2/CritterCostuming.html

I am also looking into making a full bodied puppet for this semester. I was wondering what to make the body out of? I am doing it big bird style so i already know how to do the head

My inexperience may be showing, but for big bird I would do the head, and then a giant "sleeve" neck that goes past your chest to your belly area and sew the sleeve to a foam cylinder.

Just wondering how everyone's project turned out I am interested in making this style of puppet and was hoping to hear how it all worked out for you.

take a look at my album Chuck you can see mine, he is very hot to wear. Since the pic has taking somewhat of a beating from being worn and I brought him to camp last summer where he was well loved. All minor things that can be fixed.