Koala Town

Howdy everyone!  Well, I didn’t realize I’d spent almost an entire month working on how the puppets for Koala Town would look.

But, well, that’s just how it is.  Originally, I had wanted to give them a cloth teddy bear look.  Unfortunately, my sewing skills rival Daisy Ashford’s novel writing abilities so I ended up dropping that plan out of frustration.  At the suggestion of Eric I looked into Claymation, but unfortunately all I have to work with is Play-Doh which turned out to be very uncooperative in terms of sculptability.  It kept bouncing back and mucking about so I dropped it (up yo’ butt.)  Finally, I went with what I had wanted to try for a while now:  paper sculpture.  Using papier-mache bodies and heads as a base and creating a sort of painted, pseudo-crepe paper “fur” for Koala I made a figure that resembles something of a purple pinata.  I actually like the way it looks though.  It has a minimalist feel to it that I’m starting to warm up to.  It’s not the professional quality level I wanted but given I’m a total novice at this stuff and I’m exploring new territory it’s a pretty good start.

Now, for Snake, well that was easy.  I cannibalized a stuffed crab for plush fabric when I was originally making a furry Koala.  The plush turned out to be way too thick(Koala looked like a Snorlax) so I had to scrap it but I kept the green antenna because they were perfect for Snake.  They even had wire inside for posing.  On top of that, there were two of them!  So now I have two Snakes and a Koala.  I had to take some extra fabric though and sew a tail onto the end of Snake but it came out well.  I just wish I had some embroidery thread to thicken up his eye dots.  Or maybe some fabric paint even would be simpler.  I’ll remember to get some from Hobby Lobby if I can.

Welp, I’m sure you’re bored!  Have some pictures of Koala chillin’ and riding Snake:

So, what’s next?  Well, this week I’d like to get some dialogue recorded and try to make a test video.  I’m thinking of just taking some old strips, probably the one’s before we started Koala Town.  Once we get some good footage in and I’m more comfortable with how to make these things (and also after I build some sets) I think Eric and I should be set to start writing our first pilot sketch.  Still debating if it should be a single sketch or do Koala Town as a 15 minute story/sketch show done in episodes.  If you have any thoughts feel free to post ‘em!

In other news, I bought a tripod and somewhat expanded how much table space I have for the set.  Hopefully, that will help make the sets a bit easier to work with.  We’re getting there!