Gopher Golf: Building the Golfer Puppet - Part #7

The final stage for my Golfer puppet is to create a head. Like the hands, it needs to be abnormally big to match the style of the film - but, at the same time, I needed to make sure the head wasn't so heavy that it would affect the body weight. The puppet still needs to be capable of standing up well on its own.

I experimented with creating heads which are, essentially, balls of Plasticine. The detail at the top of the head (the hair) wasn't too important at this time, since the Golfer will be wearing a hat.

The mouth has been left clear as I will be animating lip sync in Flash or After Effects, then tracking the mouth movements with the character's actions on screen. Eye movements and eyelids can also be animated separately.

However, the Plasticine was much too heavy on its own. The solution was to use a small piece of solid foam - a very light material - covered in a very small layer of Plasticine, only a few millimetres thick.

The feet are covered in a very light layer of Plasticine as well, which will add weight to the feet to help the puppet stand up correctly. However, I may not need to show the feet in the final film.