Making a giant puppet / costume for a pantomime giant

Here's a giant costume made for a panto.
It was built by adapting an existing papier mache scarecrow head, adding a lightweight support-brace to mount the head onto an actor's head and upper body. With 18" hands added, it gives a fairly big physical presence despite weighing very little.

When worn, the giant stands about 7' 6". The height is dependent on the height of the wearer. The costume adds about 20" (50cm) to the height of the operator and about 24" (60 cm) to the length of the arms, and this was a 5' 10" actor.



Inside the costume is a head mount and shoulder braces (thin black loops)



Looking up into the costume. The head sits on a skull cap, with front and back bracing to take the weight off the actor's neck.



The head itself was made previously by someone else. To make it wearable a mount was added, then a lightweight set of shoulders built up (mainly thin card over a willow stick frame with bubble wrap skinning.



A close-up of the shoulder base.



The shoulders were covered in papier mache, which was blended into the exisitng head to form on solid head and shoulder unit.



From the front...



Neck/head joint shown here after final tinted latex coat has been added for durability.



Next some hands were needed...
Note there is a whole post about how these were made:
http://makingweirdstuff.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/making-lightweight-hands-for-giant.html



The head and hands had a final coat of coloured latex, to keep the skin colours consistent



The hands were given sleeve-arms, made from white sheets...



There is bubble wrap inside the sleeves to keep them from collapsing and to make sure they still look bulky like arms...



The sleeves were attached to the shoulders...



And a tunic was fitted over the top...
You can't see them here, but each hand has a 3' pole attached for the actor to operate the puppety arms. The arm span is quite substantial.



Here it is on stage, prior to action...



And with the actor in costume. They are stooping here to allow a dresser adjust the collar, but you can get a sense of the relative size of the giant compared to the other actors.

Making lightweight hands for a giant puppet

Some simple, but rather amusing 18 inch long hands!



They started as packaging foam, glued together with hot glue...



Add to this was some cardboard to form a palm...



To which cling film was added for lightweight padding...



Seen palm up...



Here's a standard size hand for comparison...



An outer skin is added with papier mache. This is tissue (wet strength) with latex as glue



From the top...



One hand was made manky, using coloured paper in the mache layering...



Eventually looking like this...



Some knuckle joint detail was drawn on using marker pen...



and finger nails etc...



To give basic details...



Finally a top coat of coloured latex was applied. This is simply natural latex with craft paint mixed in...



yum...



Sponged on with a washing up sponge...



Drying is sigificantly accelerated with heat from a hairdryer...



The latex is opaque before it cures...



As it dries, it starts to become transparent...



The finished hands.

Making pantomime shoes

Here's a quick and dirty way to knock out a pair of comedy shoes. In this case for a pantomime giant.  This is part of a performance puppet/costume. More on that in a later post...

The shoe fits over existing shoes, and can be secured if required with black tape.



The basic structure is based on a corrugated cardboard base-board that is folded at the shoe end to make a strong structure. This is fairly roughly stapled. Strength is added later with gaffer tape.



To make the shape more rounded, bubble wrap is added. The bigger the bubble size, the lighter the structure, but the more noticeably bumby the texture.



The outside later is black gaffer (duct) tape. This is strong and bonds it all together as well as providing a smooth coloured skin.



The combination of internal stiffness from the card and outer toughness from the tape gives toughness and durability needed for a costume prop, which will take a hammering.



And here you have it... Took about 30 minutes to knock these out.



Feet go in here...



like this...



Not shown here, but added durability and protection was added later using dyed latex. This is standard natural latext which is dyed with craft paint (PVA based), but any water-based paint or ink will do it.
Shown here is a household sponge, used to apply the latex. It needs at least two coats. It can be strengthened by adding other materials. For example, if you have access to fibres from woodworking machines this makes latex extremely strong once set..