Here’s more progress on King Bob. His head is completely glued together with the features pinned on for placement. (We used ordinary contact cement to glue his head seams together. We’ll be discussing different glue methods for foam in future posts.)

This is the part of the building process that is most exciting - seeing the character you have created come to life. You have drawn the character, you’ve planned, you’ve done foam mock-ups, you know the pattern inside and out, and yet at this point, the character seems to take on a life of its own, strangely separate from its builder. We certainly don’t mean to be overly dramatic here, but it really is an incredible part of the puppet building experience.

This is great stuff! Thanks to Nate Pacheco for posting it on his blog. Check out the La Choy Dragon too!

We thought it may be a good idea to explain a little about reticulated foam for those who may not be familiar with the material. So what is reticulated foam? It is actually a foam that is used in industrial filtration systems. In fact, it is sometimes called filter foam. It is also quite frequently referred to as Scott foam.

Why use reticulated foam for puppets? There are several reasons that make this material excellent for crafting foam-based puppets.

Texture. Reticulated foam is more porous than upholstery foam or polyfoam (which is usually the kind you find at your local craft/hobby/sewing shop) and thus has a considerably rougher texture. It’s texture makes hiding seams remarkably easy. The foam’s texture also aids in carving. Small surface inconsistencies of the carved foam are virtually invisible.

Color. The foam can be purchased in a neutral color ready to be dyed. The advantage here is that a puppet builder is not limited in his/her choice of color.

Durability. Reticulated foam is strong and resilient and, if handled properly, will last for years. This is not true of polyfoam, which yellows and breaks down relatively quickly.

Because of its characteristics, reticulated foam can be left uncovered as the “skin” of the puppet. It can also be used as a sturdy understructure and covered with fabric, fur, or fleece.

For more information on where you can buy reticulated foam in bulk see the FAQ page at Project Puppet. If you would like to try it out first without the risk of a large investment, Project Puppet sells reticulated foam in small quantities.

More progress on King Bob’s head. Again, the features are pinned on to make sure we capture the character in the 3-D world. All in all, we feel he’s coming along nicely.

Time to put the pieces together! Normally we make the features first - the nose, eyes, ears, etc. That way as the head is being built, the features can be pinned on and moved around to ensure the character is staying true to form.

Above is a picture of King Bob during the building process.

A picture sure is worth a thousand words! For those of you who are familiar with the Punto Pattern, the above picture should look familiar. For those of you who have not had the chance to work with the Punto Pattern, consider this a sneak peek! Notice the changes that were made to the original pattern. Extra darts were added to fatten up King Bob’s chin. The cheeks and laugh lines were created by simply changing a straight seam to one that curves, of course, in the right places. When we glue the head together, we’ll slightly overlap the top edge of Seam #1 and Seam #2 (according to the original Punto Pattern instructions) to create the detailing.

As a side note, when designing a pattern, especially when the foam will serve as the “skin” of the puppet, appropriate seam placement can go along way. Try designing (or revising) your pattern so that the seams lay in the most inconspicuous places or places that you know will be covered by the puppet’s features. Sometimes you can incorporate a seam in the look of the character. At that point, it’s not a seam at all! It’s part of your character! Seams aren’t the worst things in the world, however, and you certainly wouldn’t want to sacrifice your character for the sake of eliminating seams. It all about striking a balance between design, function, and aesthetics.

It’s always good to take one, or two, or even more practice runs when building any character. We only did one mock-up for King Bob, due to the fact that he was based on a pre-existing pattern - The Punto Pattern. Working from a pre-existing pattern is great. It saves tons of time as any corrections or quirks in the pattern have already been worked through and corrected. We did make a couple of changes to the Punto Pattern to personalize it. You’ll notice, in the mock-up, we revised the pattern a bit to create a larger chin and to define the apple of the cheeks and laugh lines.

Making mock-ups of your characters before building the final puppets, takes a lot of guesswork out of the final build, and ultimately facilitates a cleaner design and look in the end. It also affords you the opportunity to make sure the final product stays true to the character.