e-bay-ing Your Puppets...

[Phantom]

Cool. Just PLEASE (for me) don't have Puppet Team/Ministry as part of your title. Every church ALWAYS does that. Do something different, PLEASE (for me).

I've so far been a part of Agapeland Puppet Team, His Hands Puppet Ministry, and one other title. I really hate Puppet Team/Ministry as part of a title. I also hate pre-recorded tracks. When I was performing puppetry with groups, I always fought hard to be sure we could do things live!! Pre-recorded music is fine with me, but I want to do live vocals.

And, look at me. I'm just rambling rambling rambling today, aren't I.

"Hey, look! There's Kev!"
---------------------> "Blah blah blah blah blah."

I'll shut up now.

Our church team is POGO (puppeteers obeying God's order...it was that or "No Greater Glove") We only do live performances, no pre-rec stuff. I have a couple of absolutely great performers. We like to set up cameras so that we can see people in front of the stage. At a ministry fair, we were able to yell at people walking by. It was well received. But enough about that...

I'm not even sure how to value my work. I think I build a really good puppet, but I have no comparison.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Pauly, super good and greatly sound advice!! Thanks for posting that to the forum!!

Phantom, "No Greater Glove" really cracked me up!! That's great! POGO is cool, too; but I begin thinking of a pogo stick, or a certain possum cartoon character from the 40's.

 

[Phantom]

Here is the link for the logo I designed for the team. I've really been blessed.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Cool. Did you build all those puppets on the rest of the pictures? And is that your head in the shot with all the puppet heads?

 

[Phantom]

Yeah, all of those are mine. You can see more on my site. It's representative of some but not all.

And the one that looks like an exploded frog puppet is actually my head...


The pink one in the album with the yellow hair I have deconstructed with the intention of re-doing her. She's solid, but I removed her wig and am adding golden locks of fleece (She sort of looks like Meg Ryan now...if Meg Ryan had no eyes or a nose). I'm also giving her a nose and ears oh yeah and teeth (Her mouth is really puckered...I'm sewing the mouths of my non-antron puppets now). I built her in a hurry for a Christmas program so she was lacking these things. That also explains the polar fleece, but whachagonnado...

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Exploded fro--no WAY do you look like an exploded frog. Trust me. I've seen me on too many occasions, so I would know!

Great puppets. Polar fleece isn't a BAD thing at all. Pauly mentioned it in his post above, and I like to use it for puppets, because it's cheap and you can still yeild a good result.

 

[Phantom]

I like using polar too...for certain things...I built a lion on Sunday (head anyway) out of polar...it turned out nice. (I'm going to use it Sunday for a performance then give it to my son.) I had to go to sewing the mouth though to get a consistent "non-pucker" result. With me, polar fleece and hot glue do not a good combo make.

I did learn making the nose for the lion however, that if you trim puckers and use really small stitches, that you can hide the pucker cut....say that 10 times fast...

(that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that)

I don't know, before Antron, I could get a pucker free mouth with polar and hot glue, but since then I've had problems...sewing works good though. I haven't tried sewing Antron...

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Sometimes a pucker isn't too bad, and adds to the character. One of mine, Frankie Steinatra, looks better with the puckers. If you use foam and make teeth, the pucker in the mouth of an animal isn't too bad, because the audience will focus on the teeth...but, also, the animal likely had fur going that far into the mouth anyhow. Sometimes it can be helped and made to work.

 

[Phantom]

Well, I like the fact puckers in fur are easy to hide. And puckers do add a wabi-sabi (sp) element to it. Of course, I try daily to refine my ablities. I want to build something that others can use for a long time and be proud to own. I'm hoping that a Puppetminister.com puppet will have the quality that will invite repeat business.

The first ones I've built have now surpassed 2 years of service and still look and work great...but they've been taken good care of (for the most part).