The puppet arrived from Hawaii!

On Wednesday I recieved a box through the post containing.... a female samurai warrior complete with sword! John (Hankins - the guy who made her) has truly excelled himself! She is an amazing puppet, with a proper ball jointed armature. She has a great 'no nonsense, not easily impressed' look about her. Basically she is the exact opposite of all my clay and woolly puppets. I can't wait to animate her and I am busy thinking up stories for her, along with ideas of what monstrous puppet I should create for John in return!

Here is a photo of the travelling samurai meeting the locals for the first time:

After some initial tension, the woolly monsters decided that she seemed friendly enough, despite the sword and the fact she doesn't speak much. Everyone then settled down for tea and cakes, followed by the monsters attempting some hula-dancing to make her feel at home (home being Hawaii, not Japan...). We think she is in Bolton trying to avenge something, it's just that we haven't been able to work out what.

The other photo I have to show you all is THE FIRST PROPER WOOLLY MONSTER PUPPET which I know you've all been waiting for!

He is the second character for the grim guesthouse short. He doesn't stand up (hence the reason he is leaning drunkenly against a bed) and has no tie-downs because he is an under-bed monster, and everyone knows that thay spend their entire lives lying down (it's true you know!).

He's got a armature wire and epoxy putty armature padded with polyester wadding wrapped round the wire. His skin is double crochet (which is different to American double crochet - be warned!), striped and worked in rounds. In future I must remember to use treble crochet stitch (again different to America) which stretches more and will be easier to get over the armature.

His fingers are french knitting (done on a wooden bobbin with four nails hammered into it) threaded over armature wire. The facial features are coloured felt cut to shape and are all movable or replaceable. I might give him some eyebrows too actually, for added expression.