Video made in one hectic evening with the help of the completely excellent camera-dude John Regan. Editing, animation, blah blah blah by yours truly with Flash & Final Cut Pro (I think I’m getting better), though John did totes give me a quick and awesome tutorial on appropriate use of some FCP features (once he was done mocking me for editing in the timeline, whoopsie). The music is excerpted from a_Scissors’ “How to Drown a Whale”.
You know what smells really, really bad? One of those taxidermied alligator heads sold at the more tourist-ready gas stations throughout our fine State as it’s being cut apart to become a puppet. I mean, woah, really, really bad. Also, they’re fragile. When I went to put screw eyes into the sides of the head for the control strings, part of the head almost collapsed. I reinforced the target areas with putty and hot glue, I think they’ll hold just fine, but I wish I’d done that the first time around. Those stupid heads cost $12 and the soul of an innocent gator each; I would hate to ruin one entirely.
I thought using cloth exclusively for this puppet would make her more flexible and graceful. But then I second-guessed myself and put PVC “bones” in the tops of both her arms and legs so her extremities wouldn’t roll up or twist into impossible shapes. Now her arms bend appropriately, but tend to get stuck out straight in an awkward zombie position. Not sure yet how I’ll fix this; whether I’ll do surgery to resize the PVC, weight and string the lower arms differently, or what. But I’m not gonna stand for no zombie-arm.
The chain mail-like fabric that makes up her scales was scavenged from a purse. Her basic form was built with soft fleece. When I originally started making this puppet I wanted her to be very dark: almost like a moving silhouette. I second-guessed myself again, worried that she wouldn’t translate well on an outdoor stage in the evening, and added lots of brilliant gold accents to help define her shape. Speaking of her shape: it fell short of my goal of “lithe”; she looks a little limp. Not sure that I could do/will bother doing anything to fill her out at this point.
I strung her up on a dual-plane style controller only to discover that BASIC PHYSICS IS MY ENEMY. Light weight fabric legs/feet (even with the dead batteries I planted in her shoes to weight her down) cannot be strung to meet controller points wider than their basic stance or the puppet will walk like a crazy bow-legged drunk (duh) (oops) (my bad). So after experimenting with 23,495,862,094,568,246 different ways of stringing her, I think I’m going to put her on a single-plane controller with a detachable leg control so her knee pivot points can be directly above her.
To help Brian better define his music, I created a basic script outlining the actions on stage. I figured this would provide a loose timeline for mood in his composition. After talking to Brian, he asked for more direction, with generalities about sounds and moods, so I added that. Whether anyone who is not involved in the the production can get any sense of what it will look like from this script, I don’t know, but I thought it would be an interesting piece of the development process to share. Also, anyone unfamiliar with A Scissors can learn about Brian’s music here.
During the Orlando Fringe Fest this year, I met johnny Regan iii, a really cool fella & Full Sail film grad. He’s got a great sense of aesthetics and he’s going to help me handle the video documentation of “Gift of the Magi”! We spent a couple hours chatting at my place yesterday to develop a filming strategy.
If I stop to think about all the different aspects of producing this play I get overwhelmed by how much there is to do… so I just keep focusing on small steps: finish this puppet, finish this set piece, get Brian on the phone (the hardest part of this whole process… ha). Though I do go through bouts of worrying that there’s no way I can pull this off, at this point I’m mostly just super excited.
It’s a simple design that will be executed with cloth-covered PVC and a couple weighted stands. There will be two stage exits: center, and stage right (off the stage to the ground and around its back). With the assistance of Miker Heyniger and 130,295,865,609,856 dive-bombing bugs, the skeletons of the large tower flats were completed last weekend. I’m sheathing the PVC with cloth to design scenery atop of, even though it would be simpler just to glue the crap on… Richard, our Director at Pinocchio’s Marionette Theater, always admonishes us not to “scavenge from other shows” to make a new one. But I’m poor, and I don’t have a lot of storage space, so I’m gonna make sure this PVC set is easily storable, transportable, and reusable.
The past six weeks the days hammer-smashed my brainmeats into a pulp. In addition to my normal duties at Pinocchio’s Marionette Theater, I was in a play during this year’s Orlando International Fringe Festival and had an art opening this month. I felt a little burned out today. So I decided not to push myself into doing anything too demanding (read: I slept late) and settled on starting the controls for the Magi puppets.
Why build controls before I have completed puppets, you ask? Well. Firstly, Crocogirl is very nearly complete, and before I finalize her I want to experiment with different ways of moving her so I don’t model the rest of the puppets on her and waste a ton of time finding out too late that they move like crap or whatever.
This show is less about conveying a story and more about making a sort of ambient visual. We’ll be performing on a secondary stage near the entrance to the festival, with the idea being that people passing into the Fest or on their way out to watch fireworks will stop and enjoy the show in transit. So the “story” is really nothing more than an obscure motivation for me as I build and, eventually, manipulate this show. The puppeteer(s?) will be visible during this performance, so I figure the quality and variety of manipulations must justify the visual presence of the puppeteer(s?)… all this boils down to the fact that the puppets gots to have da goods, kid in terms of movement.
ANYWAY. I briefly considered creating controls in the style of Jim Rose. These controls use a single plane, with a wire “teeter-totter” moved by the thumb to generate basic walking motions and a three-point stringing on each arm to offer delicate options in hand manipulation. I thought using the Rose control style would allow me to use more than one puppet at once with greater facility. But I changed my mind, deciding to go with the dual-plane style controller that is the standard at Pinocchio’s, since a month to build and (hopefully) rehearse a half-hour performance doesn’t really leave me room for a lot of experimentation.
Here’s a little video to show you how little I know about what I’m doing. There will be lots of stupid short videos in this blog, I think; it helps me learn about filming and editing and all that stuff I’m extra stupid about:
The final image shows the two raw “planes”. The one to the left will support the strings for the legs, hands, and mouth control. The one to the right will hang suspended about an inch below the first, and support the bulk of the puppet’s weight as well as control head movements and the all-important butt string. I’ll finish shaping and paint these controls once the puppets are done.
Thunder Hag will be presenting a performance piece featuring new puppets and sets as well as music by A Scissors. I have one month to create the visuals and Brian has the same month to create the sounds for this performance. For anyone who might be curious–but mostly so Brian and I can collaborate better–I will be blogging the building process for the show.
It starts with a story, as most stories do. There’s not much to it. A girl who lives in an Everglades-like place falls in love with a pair of hungry eyes. (There is nothing that makes you more attractive to a woman than your desire for her.) Every night it comes to watch her and want her as she performs for it. One night it ceases to appear; the girl is angry and ashamed.
She petitions the moon for help. It has seen her flirting; her lover as well. The moon drops to the earth. STUPID STUPID STUPID GIRL it chomps and gnaws and chews and spits. The moon chases the girl to frighten her away, but she IS a stupid stupid stupid girl. So she begs the moon to kill her if it will not help her.
Thus, the moon helps. Transformed, the girl wanders the swamps, searching for her lover. The desired becomes the desire-er, or whatever. She is a bird. Things happen. The moon is never seen again, but its work is evident. The lover has been transformed also. Next, an ending occurs.
Here is the concept art for the moon puppet:
I’ll be constructing him from a 10″ light fixture globe. I had to order one from an online catalogue specializing in maintenance supplies since Home Depot/Lowes do not carry them anymore. I hope I chose the right size. I also hope I don’t screw it up, since it cost $25. I seriously considered stealing one from a nearby apartment complex, but the chances of getting one that wasn’t dirty or yellowed beyond use seemed too low. Yeah, I know, I’m a jerk.
On April 12th, 2010, Thunder Hag participated in 67 Books. In celebration of National Library Week 2010 (April 11-17), 67 Books was a weeklong performance art event wherein 67 Orange County Library System (OCLS) cardholders read aloud for one hour at a time any book they chose from the OCLS collection, on the roof of Orlando Public Library. 67 Books was an independent production of Brian Feldman Projects in celebration of National Library Week.
Both Orlando Scene TV and TheDailyCity.com were kind enough to mention looking forward to the reading. Unfortunately the webcasting of the event malfunctioned while I was performing, so less than 15 minutes was broadcast or recorded; none of which feature Mr. Dragon or any of the livelier portions of the reading. Perhaps a more formal version of “Grendel Reads Grendel” will happen sometime this year.
Grendel preparing to read on the roof of the OCLS Building in downtown Orlando, with Mr. Dragon and the Shaper's mandolin. (photo: Brian Feldman)
Christmas 2009 I enjoyed performing in Nathalie Jacobs unique toy theater show, “Peanuts for Noel”. The cast of this show shared manipulation duties for all the puppets and provided live character voices and Foley effects to live piccolo accompaniment.
The picture below is a shot of the crowded backstage area of the complex 3-proscenium stage, which had its own 5-piece stage lighting incorporated into 3 separate light boards. I reconstructed the stage in Pinocchio’s venue and adapted it to rest, near-fully dressed, in 3 separate pieces atop hard wood “skis”. This way the stage could be slid, partially assembled, out of the way of the main stage after each evening performance ended to make way for Pinocchio’s regularly scheduled marionette shows during the day. Prior to each show, I would perform my regular manipulation duties at Pinocchio’s–2 or 3 shows daily, 45min. each–and then I would run down from the bridge to assemble the “Peanuts For Noel” stage, check its dressings, and hook up its lighting. Then I would dive into one of Pinocchio’s party rooms and change into my 4-layer lace-up “Mother Goose” costume, slap the “Susie” hand puppet on my left arm, and tromp directly out to deliver the introductory monologue to “Peanuts for Noel”… all in approximately 20min.
The picture below here is of the “Peanuts for Noel” cast. All of us, excluding the piccolo player, would crunch together behind the stage to perform the 30+min. show.
A site full of information about the show and lots of (unflattering of me, gorgeous of the puppets) pictures is here: Swiss Puppets: Peanuts for Noel
Ryan Price, who co-creates the Pop Means Cuddle podcast about nerd music (and also generally manages his Liberatr Media Network) stumbled across Thunder Hag and felt the need to investigate and share:
Before the Thunderland Orchestra’s first performance at Will’s Pub, there was anticipation from TheDailyCity.com, who spoke to Jessica Early, and The Orlando Weekly. After seeing the live show, The Orlando Weekly’s Seth Kubersky called Thunder Hag “inexplicable art-rockers” and credited the performance with assisting in the establishment of Will’s Pub as an art-friendly venue and Orlando as a culturally rich city.
In the past year I have been privileged to know Thomas Thorspecken, a man who has dedicated his life to sketching at least one art event in Central Florida per day for 365 days to start his sketch blog, Anaglog Artist Digital World. Thor is a part-time teacher of animation and a full-time curious kitty… he has a genuine interest in (and sense of humor about) EVERYTHING around him, which makes it impossible not to love him completely on first meeting.
His sketches are almost always of live events: full of color and energy, with lines that quiver in place as if they actually captured the motion and light he was trying to depict. Thor is a clever writer as well, summing up the factors surrounding his sketches with dryly writ observational journal entries. A somewhat subdued set of blogs follows me during the period leading up to and just after my marriage-as-protest to Brian Feldman here:
I applied for and was awarded a professional development grant for an individual artist by United Arts of Central Florida for 2010. More information regarding this grant can be found on the “Friends & Sponsors” page. Announcements of the grant receipt can be found here:
