Hi, I've made quite a few puppets but recently tried to make my first Muppet style puppet, based loosely on the famous "expert village video" tutorials. in order to push my self a little harder I copied some designs for famous examples ( copy a few master pieces to learn the art is an old tradition.) For purists out there, don't worry I won't be making a habit of it or selling them, I'm even wary of posting pictures of copies on here!
The first prototype was Ernie and most of my friends were impressed though I thought he was a mess,(learning to use a hot glue gun, to mount spoon eyes etc) One thing I got right was his mouth had that "permanent smile"

Next came Elmo. I'm very pleased with him. I learnt a lot from making Ernie, better with the glue gun, better eyes and nose, big step up, EXCEPT his mouth.
Most Muppets have no expression, the puppeteer's animation supplies that, but Ernie has that smile and I would hope that Elmo would have at least a neutral expression. Mine is good but has a slight down turn to his mouth, not like he's sad but ( because his mouth is so wide)more like he's a bit scared. I worked from the same pattern for both with the exception that I flattened the top of Elmo's head a little to get more of a football shape.

My question is, does any body know, roughly what creates that extra fabric to make a permanent smile?

Should the mouth be across the center of the round head or slightly above or below? I think Ernie had his slightly below centre as a human mouth is, but I'm wondering if "flattening the head" might have made the fabric pull up in the middle. Any thoughts or, preferably observations from experiences would be great.
Scoob

My question is, does any body know, roughly what creates that extra fabric to make a permanent smile?

That pattern for the puppet need to be such that the mouth is open all the time unless a puppeteer holds it shut. Closing the mouth creates the extra fabric or simile.

You should post the images so others can see your work!  There is nothing wrong with imitation of something you admire in order to learn.    I do believe strongly in following copyright and such, I think we get a bit carried away at times. I would bet you that most all the animators at Disney started out by copying Mickey and the other characters at first.  If folks give you hard time about it send them my way.

Thanks for such a prompt reply Shawn, I'll work on getting those pictures, but it will take a few days, (I make them at work forced breaks, I won't be back there for a few days) Elmo's mouth is open unless held and operates pretty well. Your answer makes me suspect that it could be the foam inside the head.

With Ernie (No#1 puppet) his foam for his head was a bit narrow so I put in some extra padding to fill out the football shape under his ear. His bottom jaw was a bit weak and a foam chin was an afterthought, by then he had hot glue under his bottom lip and his lip is a bit pinched to the mouth board. I think he kept his smile but I moved on pretty quickly to Elmo, eager to apply what I had learnt!
 With Elmo I customised his "head foam" a bit more and fixed a foam chin to his mouth board before I glued it in (largely to prevent the lip pinching down on the board if I got messy with the glue) It could be that it is pushing out the smile fabric before it had a chance to make the fold. Let me check Ernie again too, it might be that his smile is a bit pushed out now too with all the extra bits.
Photos and more info in a few days, off to bed now
Scoob

That pattern for the puppet need to be such that the mouth is open all the time unless a puppeteer holds it shut. Closing the mouth creates the extra fabric or simile.

You should post the images so others can see your work!  There is nothing wrong with imitation of something you admire in order to learn.    I do believe strongly in following copyright and such, I think we get a bit carried away at times. I would bet you that most all the animators at Disney started out by copying Mickey and the other characters at first.  If folks give you hard time about it send them my way.

I agree..................... I would be flattered if someone tried to build one of my puppets, they could probably teach me something new. Yes I would love to see pictures of your work.

Billy D.

Hey Steve - glad to see another Aussie on here! If you know of any good resources for materials let me know; I'm always trying to find out more about the local industry here. Whereabouts in Oz are you?

I've finally got some pictures for you, I had some trouble resizing them ( I was kind of shocked at how small the disk quota is for gallery pictures.
So Ernie has the smile but Elmo is terrified. I don't know if it's where I placed the mouth or the shape of the fabric ( I "flattened the head a little, trying to get more of a football shape, perhaps this pulled up the  centre of the mouth...) I'm trying Elmo again with a slightly rounder head (higher from the top lip to the crown of the head). Won't finish it till next week, I work on these 5 to 10 minutes at a time on average, with the occassional burst of an hour once a week. I'm starting to log the time a bit, out of curiosity.
Na. I'm in Melbourne at the moment, though I've lived in sydney and originally hail from Brisbane...Great logo there with the tram. I've seen some of your site, in fact I think I got the link there for the video to a moving eye lid mechanism. I haven't tried it yet but it was very informative, thanks for that

Steve
You should have been able to upload images larger then what you ended up with. Not sure what the problem was.  The only limit I have set is on width and height of display of images and that is still set large enough so the images show pretty large on the screen.  It could be that the resolution was so high on the images that the system was timing out before they could be uploaded and modified on the server.

UPDATE: Ahh... I see what the issue was with the images. I forgot that I had quota set for new members that was lower.  Things where set up where you had to post at least 5 times before that was upgraded.  I changed that now to 3 post. You should be able to add some more images is you want.

Your guys look great!  You should be proud!  Now the next step is to create a charecter of your own.  That could be as simple as taking what you have learned from each puppet and combining them.

Welcome to P&S!

And I agree with Mr. Sorrell, Great puppets! Well done. hopefully we can see more of you work here.
Any question, speak out! You will find so greatest artist (Puppets designers) here in P&S.

Miguel!

Ah, thanks for the info re:picture size, I can understand limiting people till you know that they're serious. (no the resolution is lower too!).
Thanks also for the compliments on my work, but has anyone noticed with their own puppets, the shape of the mouth based on some x factor? The mouth board in Ernie is flexible plastic and distorted out of shape. Elmo got more rigid (foam core board).
Being rigid, it can't actually be "down turned" it must be an illusion, as I write this I'm thinking it might be sitting vertically, (to use a muppet analogy, like Beakers mouth) instead of horizontal. Now to work out what would cause that...Hmm fodder to distract me. I'm off to check him out, won't have an answer for a while I have a big day ahead.
In the meantime, anyone who's used the expert village videos to build a puppet, check your mouths and let me know if you have this grimace too, if so, what variations are there in the puppet. Building a foam head first then draping the fabric would almost certainly avoid this, but there's so much hand sewing! He he.
Sorry to badger about this but the answer will be a major tool for dictating expression in a puppet. I really do appreciate your kind words about my work and over all I'm very happy with Elmo.
Gotta go!
Scoob

I really like the Elmo, he's really quite good.

Na. I'm in Melbourne at the moment, though I've lived in sydney and originally hail from Brisbane...Great logo there with the tram. I've seen some of your site, in fact I think I got the link there for the video to a moving eye lid mechanism. I haven't tried it yet but it was very informative, thanks for that.

Yay! Another Melbournian! Glad you like the site (and logo).

Yeah the video for the blinking eye is good. I think I need to try it again at some point, since I made some major stuff-ups in the first one.

I haven't used any of the Expert Village videos, so I can't help, but my mouths usually come out fairly straight and doesn't have any up- or down-turning in the corners. It's probably the difference in materials/technique.