Hi everyone.

I'm in the process of making a puppet that's 50% larger than the other puppets that I have made. 

I'm thinking about making the puppet so that there are two spots that you could put your hand into it, depending on what you want to use it for.  The puppet is going to have a foam body, so it will be rather rigid.  My idea is to leave the bottom open like a typical puppet so that it could be used as a standard puppet, but to also have some way to put your hand into it's head from the back of it's neck, so that you could have it sit on your leg and use it almost like a ventriloquist puppet. 

My question...when doing this, should I basically just not sew the back of the neck to the back of the body and have that be the opening???  Or is there some other way that you guys would suggest that I go about doing something like this?? 

Thanks!
Jeff

Jeff,

There are two approaches you can take to this. The first approach is similiar to what you have already figured out where you enter at the neck, but you have a vertical seam in the back of the neck that you leave open.

The other way to do it would be to make a whole in the upper back of your puppet that you enter the puppet from.  This is a more traditional approach for ventriloquist dummy.

Just noticed this thread now. .... Once in a while, I'll get a request to build a puppet like  this.  I usually build a standard hand and rod puppet, with the usual opening at the bottom, but I will add legs to the area as well.  I will make them removable via velcro, when not in use as a ventriloquist character or a puppet who needs legs to be shown.  And then, like Shawn suggests, I will then add a second hole in the back of the puppet, which is more of a slit, than a circular hole.  I will have the material slightly overlap so you cannot see inside the puppet, if the character has it's back to the audience for any given moment.  But you can easily put your hand into the back when necessary.  Good luck with your creation!

Thanks guys.

I ended up using a slit in the back of the neck of the puppet for the dual entry.  But it's not visible when you are using the puppet with your hand in the bottom.  I think it worked out really well.

I actually installed a snap to hold the slit closed when it's not being used. 

GENIUS! i had always thought about this, how it would be nice to be able to transfer from 'camera' puppet, to more like a vent puppet for live shows, or for just playing around i really like your idea, and im glad it worked out!