Finishing Up Development

I haven't made a post in a long time! Well, on the 7th, school started. Of course that means I am getting up at 6:15, (school starts at 7:20) and then coming home at 2. I usually have a snack, and watch Ellen. Then I have homework, activities, dinner, etc. So, for the first week, Sesame Street got nowhere. It wasn't until the 2nd week of school until I started working on the video.

Sesame Street is coming along pretty much on schedule. I have already blogged about 10 of the 15 characters, and all of the sets. So, I wanted to finish up the characters this week. In my previous post, I said I made a bunch of characters out of clay, well those were definitely dried after the week that sat there.

The first person I worked on was Honkers. There really isn't a character named "Honkers" on the show, it's more of species. They are muppets that have a big oval nose and trumpet-like horns on top of there head. When they press there nose, the horns make a noise. So, I looked at a bunch of them and decided the color combination I wanted. I decided on a neon green, pink and yellow color scheme. I started by painting his body neon green and this nose and horns a golden yellow. Then once the body was dry, I glued on his hair. His hair was hot pink and I grabbed a big lump if string and hot glued it on his head. Then he got a haircut! After the hair was shaped the way I wanted it, I hot glued on the yellow horns. Then I did finishing touches on him such as putting his arms on with wires, gluing on his eyes and putting pupils on, and gluing him to a base. Honkers was done!
Development




Ernie with a few Honkers


A few days later I started wok on Prairie Dawn. Prairie Dawn is probably one of the most human-like characters on Sesame Street. She is king of like a little girl, she always wears a dress, has short blond hair and plays the piano.



Prairie Dawn

 I started by painting her head, legs and arms pink. As that was drying, I cut out a purple dress for her. After she was dry, I glued the dress on her body. Then I painted 2 white circles on her face for her eyes. When they dried, I drew on her pupils and eyelashes. Then I started her hair. I cut yellow string glue used elmer's glue and painted a layer of it on her head. I placed the yellow string on it and then painted the roots with glue. The bangs were difficult because they were so small. They are probably about 5mm wide. So, it was hard to glue them on there, but I did. Then I attached all her parts and looked at her. Something was missing. Her dress was too boring, so I put a yellow sash on it. It looked much better! Another character done!

Prairie Dawn

Then I made Herry. I used blue paint for his body and after it dried I put streaks of light blue in it. I painted his nose purple, mouth black and glued on his eyes. Then I drew on his big eyebrow with a sharpie. I attached all the parts and put him on a base! Herry was done! 13 characters done, 2 to go!

The more and more I looked at Zoe, the more I thought she was missing something. When I googled her, I realized, she needed fur on the sides of her face and necklaces and bows and clips. So painted Elmer's glue on the sides of her face and attached different shades of gold and yellow string. Then I made necklaces, bows and clips out of foam sheets and glued them on her. Zoe looked so much better and I was much happier with her.

The next character I made is Snuffy. (Mr. Snuffleupagus). I wanted to make Big Bird and Snuffy out of clay at the same time. I started making Snuffy and he was huge! i usually get 3 or 4 characters out of 1 pack of clay. Snuffy took about 3 packs out clay to make. I have never made a character of that volume. I obviously did not calculate the right amount of clay for him, because I was out. That means I couldn't make Big Bird! It took 2 days before we had a chance to go to Joann's to get another tub of clay. So that will slow down production because I have to make Big Bird and let him dry.

Snuffy

I got this shirt a few months back and I was looking at it and I saw the dog in the right hand corner. I vaguely remember him from my child hood and I really wanted to make him. I looked him up and his name is Barkley. So, that adds another character to my list! So, I now have a total of 16 characters.



My Shirt

 After I shaped Snuffy, I set him on the table to dry.

I had a few more props and minor set things to do, so I did them! I made a chandelier for the "Batty Bat" mansion set. I used glue and lots of gold glitter. I added that to the set and it fit in perfectly. I also made a piano that Count Von Count will play. It is purple with orange designs on it.

Count Von Count's Unfinished Piano

That is it for now!

Whats Left? Big Bird, Barkley, Finishing Snuffy, Props, Shooting the movie!