Final Project - Puppet - Policeman

The policeman doesn't really do anything, he doesn't even have hands, he basically only exists to stand around and give context to certain scenes (he only appears in 2). Technically he isn't even a puppet, as he can't move, more of a sculpture.

 His hands are perpetually behind his back to disguise the fact that he doesn't have any hands.

 His legs are just bits of balsa, no wire, so they don't bend. They don't need to anyway.

 Shiny shoes.

The colour of his uniform actually took 3 days to make, it wasn't as simple as I though it would be, I spent bloody ages mixing about 13 completely different colours to get the right shade of dark blue. As a result of the experimental nature of the colour, I didn't make that much of it in case it went tits up and I lost a load of decent plasticine, so the back of the puppet is bare balsa.

 I looked at old crime scene photos to see what 1920's American police uniforms looked like.

 Creepy pig lady aside, this was the basis for the puppet.

Final Project - Puppet - Frank

Frank is a Massive dirty tramp who sells information on police activities to the narrator, He is a crazy old civil war veteran who no-one takes seriously, except the narrator, who uses his information to successfully avoid the filth.

His puppet originally had a different body, but then I came up with the idea of making him a civil war veteran, and remade his body with a confederate army jacket, it helps with the crazy.

 At this stage he looks a wee bit like Sean Connery...

 I went with the handlebar mustache because it made him seem more 'American'

 This was his original body, but I ended up repurposing it for the narrator's father.

 His new body, with the confederate army jacket (he had to be on the losing side, it makes more sense). Since the American civil war lasted from 1861-65, it makes Frank quite old, even if he was only 16 or so during the war, the film is set in 1920 and 1927, with Frank appearing in both time frames, this would make him at least 82 by the film's end. I think he can pass for 82.

Frank is first shown standing in front of a burn barrel, which is a tin can with holes drilled in and a tea light placed inside, this creates a good flickering effect and the flame itself is not visible. The flame also has an interesting effect on Frank's eyes, as he has very large brown pupils, they reflect the light and appear to glow (not seen in this picture), giving him a fittingly creepy look.

This was the image that gave me the idea of turning Frank into a confederate loon, I did think about giving him the hat as well, but I liked his hair too much to cover it.

Final Project - Puppet - Sal

Sal is the secondary antagonist of the film and does not appear until very near the end, although he will be mentioned several times throughout. He is, quite clearly, very closely based on Al Capone and aside from the added 'S' to his name, he basically is Al Capone. His role in the film has changed several times, and at one point he was to be the central character, then he changed to the boss that the narrator worked under, (a role since allocated to Giovanni) then a rival gangster who was the narrator's ally, even lending him money. There was a moment during pre-production when I considered removing him from the film altogether, as I couldn't think of a decent role for him to play. Now he is the kingpin of the Chicago bootlegging racket (as the real Capone was) who offers the narrator a pathetically small amount of money ($1) for his stake in the speakeasy, then orders him and his associates killed when he (obviously) turns it down. So he's a massive dick, basically.
His puppet was made quite early on, and was the first to be given a body. Due to a minor oversight, his eyes don't move particularly well, as I concentrated too much clay around them, essentially 'boxing' them in, though I think I can fix this quite easily. I also forgot to take any pictures of the head as I was making it.

 Slanted trilbies were very 'in' back in 1927, apparently.

 His arms aren't very well made to be honest, I didn't use animation armature wire, so they don't bend as easily as some other puppets. Shouldn't be too much of a problem though, unless one falls off...

 I had no idea what colour Capone's eyes were, as all photos of him are in black and white, but I think they were brown. So I made Sal's eyes green, just because.

 He was supposed to be smoking a cigar in his intro scene, but animating smoke in stop motion without using CG (or with it) is beyond me.

 This picture was take about 5 months after the puppet was made, his arm fell off, so I replaced it with an updated armature and it's fine now, the other arm still has the old armature style however. I'll replace it if it also falls off.

 I based his outfit on one worn by Robert De Niro in 'The Untouchables"...

And on this picture I found of a statue of Capone that made the news because it was stolen from some mad old bird's garden.

I also decided to slim his face down a bit to make him resemble Capone a bit more, and added the scars that gave Capone the infamous moniker 'Scarface' (Capone actually had 3 scars, but that looks silly).

Final Project - Puppet - Vincenzo

Vincenzo is Sal's right hand man. He acts as a link between the Narrator and Sal, and is also the gunman who kills everyone at he end on Sal's orders, only to be shot in the face by an injured narrator.
His head, like Dave and Henri's, was made months before the body, and was sculpted while I was still experimenting with my model-making technique.

 Some of his facial features are modeled after John Dillinger, the infamous 1930s bank robber and 'public enemy'. This was because during the early development of the story it was going to stretch from the 1920s through to the 1930s and the great depression, with the narrator becoming a bank robber to make ends meet after the bootlegging went awry. But this would have tripled the length of the film, and is probably an entire film in itself.

 I glossed the crap out of his hair to give him a 'greasy' look. This was the first of many things I glossed. I like glossing things.

 I studied Italian suits to make his costume, but I ran out of plasticine when I was sculpting it, so he is very flat and can't be filmed from the side.

 He and Sal both share the same set of hands, as neither of them get much screen time and both have the same skin colour this seemed an appropriate time saver.

Final Project - Puppet - Mae

The Mae puppet was only recently finished, as I needed to film the scene with the narrator's parents so I could repurpose the mother's puppet, which I did by ripping off her head and giving her a dress. Then I made Mae's head, who incidentally is named after Mae Capone, Al Capone's wife.

She has a very oddly shaped head, due to the balsa core shifting back when i was sculpting the face, I tried to cover this up with her hair, but she still has a dodgy chin. Filming is well underway now, so I don't have time to fix it, the only way I can is to remove the balsa core and reshape the head, In this case, it would actually be faster to completely replace the head altogether, but no time, so I will just have to improvise with clever camera angles.
Oh and that's supposed to be a shawl around her shoulders, not a towel. Close enough, I say.

Final Project - Puppet - Dave

Midnight Dave is the 'Trigger Man' of the group (He's good at shooting people) and the guy who gets the guns. His name is not a racial slur, it's an affectionate nickname given to him by a group of his peers, and as black people were not treated... very well back then this is my (half arsed) way of addressing it. In the film, Dave and the Narrator are the 'Hatchet Men', basically they do all the killing and the others handle the business.
His puppet, like Henri's, was made a long time ago, with the head being made months before the body. As I developed my new sculpting technique, I went back and re-did his head because I hated his old one.

 His original head was just far too horsey for my tastes.

 So I replaced his nose, fattened him up and ripped his bottom jaw off. As you do...

 He is one of only 4 characters to have teeth, although he is probably the only one who doesn't need them.

At one point I was going to have him holding a snake, the only reason for this is that I wanted to animate a snake slithering through his hands, but as my research developed the film became less comedic (it was originally going to be very 'silly') and more realistic, so the snake seemed pointless and a bit weird (I have since replaced the snake with a tommy gun). The film will still have comedic elements in it, but they'll be hidden and you'll have to look for them.

His body (and him is general) is actually based on Frozone from the Incredibles for some reason, I really have no idea why, he just is. Accept it and move on. I have.

Final Project - Puppet - Henri

Henri is the barman at the speakeasy, and aside from that, he doesn't really do much else. His puppet head was actually the first I made back in November, when I was trying out a new modeling style. I spent quite a lot of time experimenting with different sculpting techniques and he had about 6 different looks before I settled on the final one. His body was made about 6 months later than the head.

 No E.T. You can't phone home, in fact, I'm going to rip your face off and start again.

 At this point you can probably tell that he is violently French...

 His balsa torso was actually made for the Prohibition agent's armature, but was too wide.

 You can't tell from any of these shots, but he has a really long nose...

Test shot of Henri at the bar, he'll never be shown anywhere else and as such has no need for legs, he has a metal strip on the bottom of his puppet that is holding him to a tin can with a magnet. The tin can will always be kept out of shot and the same method will be used for all of the half puppets.