Complete newbie to puppet making - trying to make cool dragon hand and/or shoulder puppets for local ren fair.

Bob

Welcome to Puppets and Stuff.  We have a few members that have made the shoulder puppets in the past.  Not sure where those threads are but if I find them, I'll point you to them. Actually since you are new to puppet making it might be easier to make a hand in mouth puppet. Browse around the forum and see what you can find. There is a lot to sort through.  

I did the renfest circuit for a few years.  Which one are you planing to attend?

We're going to the Tn Ren Fair, south of Nashville.
I want to make a simple puppet, much like this one, which is basically a head on a stick, along with arms,legs and tail attached to a bean bag:

http://cgi.ebay.com/PET-baby-DRAGON-griffin-hand-puppet-renaissance-LARP-/120684929813?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1c1961e315#ht_6601wt_1304

Hi Bob,
nice meeting you! The dragon baby is really sweet. Covered with fur it should be relativly easy to reproduce.
Sorry to distract: Shawn, that is a very cool Wyvern! How many joints do you have in the torso (looks like just two, am I right)? What is the "skin"? What material are the wings made of?

Welcome to Puppets and Stuff.............. I found these post

http://puppetsandstuff.com/community/index.php/topic,3723.msg32469/topicseen.html#msg32469

http://puppetsandstuff.com/community/index.php/topic,3761.msg32833/topicseen.html#msg32833

Bob,
I think you are right about the puppet you posted the link to. Should be pretty easy to build one of those.   You would need to have some way that the body anchored to your hand I think. You could make the head out of something like Creative Paper Clay or Sculpy.

Rikka,
Actually there are three joints in the torso of the body. The main movement though is just in the top first one really which is where you can see the diffrance in color. The "chest" is a hard surface of paper mache' and the bottom halves are individual paper mache' pieces covered in a stretch cotton that is painted. The concept did not work as well as I would have liked.   The wings are spandex that has been painted.