Character making- Norman

To build Norman, I first made an armature from a kit I bought off of the animation took kit and then assembled it according to the sizes I measured out. I then made a wire frame that was the same size as my metal armature so that the clay mould I made was the right size. 

Then I built the clay mould based to the character designs drawn by Rosy.

Unfortunately, my Norman clay mould dried and fell off my desk, meaning it cracked and I had to re-make it which slowed down my making process, however the second mould I think looked better so it all worked out.

To create the actual stop motion puppet, I rolled out a square of clay that was thicker than my character, drew a line around the size of my character and then carved down into the clay square so that Norman fit halfway into the square. 

Then, after putting up boards around the clay square and sealing all the gaps with more clay to make it air tight, I mixed and poured silicone into it. I, however, didn't make enough the first time around and his head, feet and stomach were breaking through the silicone so I had to mix some more and add thixotropic to make the silicone thicker to cover those parts. 

Once the silicone was dried, I expanded the clay walls and poured a plaster jacket over the silicone to hold my mould in shape for casting my character. 

Then I flipped it over once that was dry and covered my silicone with a release agent repeated the process for the other half of my character.

Once the second half of my mould was dried, I opened up the two, cleaned all the clay off and removed my clay mould placed my metal armature inside. I had to tie some string to the armature so that I could suspend the character in the middle of my mould. I also had to cover the joints with plaster so that the substance I cast my character in would not get into them and stop them from moving. 

I had originally wanted to use silicone to cast my characters, but as I was running short on time to get these characters casted, and I didn't know how the silicone would move as I hadn't had time to experiment with it. I also did not want to risk being unable to get the metal armature out if it did not work. Because of these reasons, and the fact that I had already practiced using it in our workshop, I chose to use foam latex. This was not my first option as I think foam latex bounces back a little too much when moving and it might be a challenge for stop motion.