Wolf from an animated Christmas deer

**Effie** · 08-02-2009,03:03 PM

I've started my wolf!! I got the faux fur from Joanne's -- luckily a friend told me to download the 40% coupon because the fur is about $15.00 per yard and the coupon made it way more affordable.

Here are the photos of my progress so far -- first I took off all the lights:

Then I threaded the cord down through the leg so it would be unobtrusive after the "furring" was done:

Then I started applying the faux fur to the legs -- at first I thought "why use tape, I don't think I'll need it" but when I started applying the fur, I realized there was no place to glue it to! So I started taping up the body as I went along. I thought about using some padding of some sort, but I thought a "bony" look would be good:

I also made a "tail" out of a coat hanger and looped it through the "reindeer" tail and taped it on. It looks pretty good so far:

The fur goes on really easily using the hot glue gun -- I am just taking it a section at a time.

I noticed the faux fur has a "grain" to it -- the fur sort of "grows" in one direction so when you cut the pieces off, you can make sure the fur is going in the right direction and it covers any seams you would have showing. It's really hard to make a mistake because the fur covers a lot of mistakes.

I just taped up the underside of the neck instead of all around in order to lighten the load on the motor -- I don't want the head to be too heavy. Also -- during the taping and furring process, I kept checking to make sure I wasn't obstructing the mechanism that animates the head -- just to be on the safe side, I left the undercarriage open:

This is as far as I've gotten -- I'm still waiting for my wolf mask to arrive -- i found one on eBay for about $6.00 and it looked pretty cool. The only problem is it has reddish hair but I found a web site that says you can use Kryon Acrylic Metallic spray paint and that works pretty well to color the hair if you apply it lightly and comb it through, so I'll try to get the hair on the mask to match the fur on the body -- I did look for reddish fur at Joann Fabrics, but I checked two different stores and all they have is white and black.

I'll post some more pictures when I get to that part! At this point it looks more like my neighbor's shepherd/lab mix dog -- but hopefully it'll get scarier once I get the mask on it!

I'm still trying to figure out what to do for feet, if anything -- the darkness on Halloween night hides a lots of details anyway!! Oh, and I just remembered, I need to figure out what to do for the eyes if I want them to light up! I better figure that out before I do anything else! Hmmm, maybe I'll get some of those LED creature eyes on eBay -- I wonder what color would be best, orange or green -- maybe red?

This is really fun - not so hard as it seemed it would be.

I'll post more as it comes along -- probably next weekend! And I'll post a video of it once it's complete.

**Dragonomine** · 08-02-2009,06:01 PM

Ooh! I can't wait to see more!!

**Deadna** · 08-02-2009,10:15 PM

How many yards does it take to do this? I have a reddish mask too and can't find any matching fur either and I have been searching for YEARS!
I do have one mask in black/grey that comes in pieces and you kind of stick them to your face and fill in with makeup only I will use fur to fill it in if I have to use them instead of the really neat reddish mask I have.

**yardhauntjunkie** · 08-02-2009,11:54 PM

Originally Posted by Deadna

How many yards does it take to do this? I have a reddish mask too and can't find any matching fur either and I have been searching for YEARS!
I do have one mask in black/grey that comes in pieces and you kind of stick them to your face and fill in with makeup only I will use fur to fill it in if I have to use them instead of the really neat reddish mask I have.

I was wondering how many yards yours used as well. I used exactly 1 yard on mine, but mine is smaller. I had to do the head on mine though, because I didn't use a mask. With my coupon at Joanne's I got my fur for $5 including the tax.

**yardhauntjunkie** · 08-02-2009,11:57 PM

Oh and the other thing I was wondering is if you are going to have it "eating something", because the head goes up and down it would be cool if there was a carcass under it.

I don't normally like the gorey stuff, but I think this would be a cool idea with the up and down motion.

**Dragonomine** · 08-03-2009,07:45 AM

Deadna, I purchased 2 yards of fur for mine and that was the perfect amount. I know what you mean about not finding an exact match color fur to the mask. I just got what was closest. It'll be dark anyway.

**Effie** · 08-05-2009,03:58 PM

I got the end of a bolt and it was 1 7/8 yards -- right now I have about half a yard left, plenty to do the neck. I spray painted the hair on the mask with black krylon acrylic paint and it looks pretty gross but that's okay!! I'll post some more pics this weekend. I am definitely planning to have some bones under it's head, like it's eating them, and maybe one in it's mouth -- nothing too gory or scary for the tots plus I don't like the gory stuff!

I found out that light shines through the eyes that are on the mask so I bought a set of the led eyes on eBay tonite & I'll try taping them behind the eyes. Now I'm trying to decide how to make the tail, plus I think the fur on the body needs to look more mangey --- maybe some rust colored paint might work?

This is really an easy and fun project -- you're only limited by your imagination!

**yardhauntjunkie** · 08-05-2009,07:44 PM

Originally Posted by Effie

Now I'm trying to decide how to make the tail, plus I think the fur on the body needs to look more mangey --- maybe some rust colored paint might work?

This is really an easy and fun project -- you're only limited by your imagination!

To mat the hair down on mine, I used hair spray. Just an idea. Can't wait to see some pics of it all done with the eyes lit up.