Thread: Prop/Costume Brainstorming.

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Alright, it's time to consolidate all the brilliant, and demented, brainpower of this group.

Background: Congratulate me, I just got engaged to the love of my life. For the night of the engagement, I surprised her with dinner at the Sun Dial Restaurant in Atlanta and front row seats to “The Lion King” (stage version).

To everyone on this forum, if you get the chance you HAVE to go see this. It is a costumer’s dream. Even has some for the propsters here, too.

Of all the costumes/props, the one that I enjoyed the best was Timon (the hyenas came in a very close second).



The possibilities of this costume are expansive. Keep the mechanics, change the form (say a badly decomposed zombie) and the puppeteer would be clad all in black, and you have an excellent prop. Similar to the Weird Walkers, but more involved and much more effective. (for that matter, with the puppeteer in black, and the puppet painted in blacklight reactive paints, could be VERY effective).

A few observations that’s not apparent on the picture:

The connections from Timon to the puppeteer include the feet, and a hard point (solid rod) from between the shoulder blades of the puppet to the belt-buckle area of the puppeteer.

The arms are controlled by handles behind the elbows of the puppet. The right handle can be placed in a socket on the puppeteer’s right thigh. This frees up the right hand to manipulate the head and mouth, and the puppet’s right arm doesn’t hang helplessly.

When the puppeteer’s right hand is manipulating the puppet’s arm, the head is controlled solely by two black chords that connect the sides of the puppet’s head to the puppeteer’s head. This allows side to side movement of the head while both of the puppeteer’s hands are busy with the arms of the puppet. It would probably be simple to add simple finger movements.

The puppet’s torso and neck are rigid.

I’ve already created my own Weird Walker ($40 to build vs. $800 to buy) and believe this wouldn’t be that much more of a task.

So, any ideas and/or comments?

I am not much help, just wanted to say congrats on your engagement (ya did good- very romantic). What you are talking about prop wise, sounds cool, I have never had experience with them though, so no help, but it does dsound like a good scare, especially if the puppeteer is in black, and the other in glow paints under black light.
Also love the avitar(sp?) it looks like me with my computer!!lol!