Modelmaking

Here you'll find a selection of puppets, props and miniatures which I have made. Please note - We are usually squirreling away on new things which we cant show yet but I try to update this page as often as I can!

Trolli "Bag" -Stick man

The sculpt was blocked out by Nathan Flynn, I sculpted all of the detailing and texturing in plastiline. I took it through the processes of moulding,  casting, assembling and painting. I made ali fastcast moulds and silicone moulds because different sections of the body are made out of different materials. The body, legs and head are made from fast cast. His arms and font panels are made from latex with expanding foam inside and he has magnetised face replacements. I was on set doing maintainance for 2 weeks doing additional puppet build and repair. Watch the commercials below.

Trolli "Mouth Monster" - Villagers

 I made these 5 little villagers (plus a mini stunt villager) to run away from the monster terrorising their village! They have wire armatures with plastizote and snip foam bodies, rig points and foot tie downs, k&s wrists and necks as well as fimo heads, hair and hands. Mini props made by Stephanie Howell. Felt costumes by Rachel Brown. I also made lots of expressions, lip sync mouths, brows & pupils out of fimo. I was on set doing maintainance for 2 weeks in which time we made and repaired a whole host of strange and wonderful things. Watch the commercials below.

Purplebricks - "Nice Seb" & "Family Time" ​ - General puppetmaking

Puppets were sculpted, armatured, haired & painted by Sculptdouble. Other puppetmaking tasks were done by Sam Holland, Kat Probert & Vicky Humphris. I was a general puppetmaker on this job, mostly making styrene eyelids as well as colour matching & mixing silicone. Watch the commercials below.

Chuck Steel: Night of the Trampires - Sculpting & general puppetmaking

I worked on Chuck Steel for nearly 3 years and my first job was as a runner in the puppet dept. I learnt how to sculpt plasticine heads for background characters (shown in the compilation pic at the top) and eventually on to the main cast. I also learned to sculpt with plastiline and made a lot of the hands for trampires and main cast. I also learnt a lot of general puppetmaking skills. When I moved to  animation roles I animated life size sculpt through plasticine hand shots for 3 months before moving on to character work. By the end of the film I was animating sequences with multiple main characters using sculpt through plasticine animation. I also animated  on Early Man & Shaun the Sheep series 6 so I am very familliar with plasticine sculpting.

Chinese short film - miniature coachman and horse

I worked in Changchun in northern China for 2 months making puppets for a short stop motion film. I went with other members of my puppet crew who were Vicky Humphris and Josh Flynn and together we set up the puppet studio, produced 5 puppets and taught the local teachers our puppetmaking techniques. I made the mini coachmen who was around 7cm tall. I sculpted him in chevant and then moulded in both silicone and fastcast because different parts of the body were made of different materials. His torso, legs and head were cast in fastcast. His arms, neck and cape were cast by painting in layers of latex and then filling the void with expanding foam and then painted with acrylics. I didnt make the carriage but as the puppet had to fit that prop I used it to ensure everything was in the correct scale. I didnt sculpt or mould the horse but I cast it out using the same latex and foam technique. There was a lot of trial and error because we were using unfamilliar Chinese chemicals but eventually we managed to find processes which worked. We did a lot of problem solving and adapted our methods to the available materials and resources.

Baku netsuke

The Baku was a personal project because I saw a netsuke in the V&A museum and wanted to challenge myself to make a replica. I sculpted it out of chevant, moulded in silicone, cast using fastcast and painted layers of dark wash in enamels.

Life Size Props

Here is a selection of life size props I made. The sword handle was sculpted in plastiline, moulded in silicone and cast in fastcast with a skin of cold cast bronze which I buffed before painting with acrylics. I carved the wooden blade and applied foil before spraying to dirty down. The spanner was cast in gun foam and sprayed silver to look real. The skull rock was polycarved, fibreglassed and painted with acrylics using dark washes and drybrushing.

Experimental Jewellery

When I was a foreign exchange student in Hong Kong I took jewellery for a semester. We worked with non-ferrous metals, initially in brass and then in silver. We learnt standard jewlery techniques such as how to make and size rings, how to make chain links by hand and how to make stud and drop earrings. Later we were given assignments to make pieces which connect two parts of the body and can be worn in multiple ways. I loved that class because we were encouraged to take inspiration from many places as well as learning craft skills such as soldering, sawing, filing, hammering, drilling, sanding & buffing.