'The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe' Update

I can finally give a little update on the project I was working on for 3 months.

A short behind the scenes was posted on the main youtube page last week and I can now share one some pictures of the puppet I spent most of my time working on.

The tree warrior aka 'Twig Boy'

I started out with a wire armature then built up the sculpture with balsa wood.

I also sculpted a few heads out balsa wood to finish him off

By the time I had finished that it was time to for me to go down to Aardman for two weeks. When I got back he had been molded and cast in silicone. My buddy Adam did an amazing job of casting him and doing an even more awesome job with some back painting to get a a super real wood effect. The puppet has a ball and socket armature built by the super talented Wes over at http://www.animationtoolkit.co.uk/

Then came the meticulous task of layering the puppet with more balsa wood to add lots of nice sharp branches and to also help it look even more realistic in regards to being formed from a tree. I think after he was finished I ended up adding some more to him but unfortunately I didn't get a photo after he was fully finished but he doesn't look much different then he does in these photos.
I also made him some shield's from big chunks of bark with wire attached to secure it to the puppets arm.

 I am really proud of how this chap came out.

Here is the behind the scenes video where you can see some of the amazing things that was happening around me.
There are some ridiculously talented people in the video and am so privileged to have worked beside them all.
Check out the awesomely awesome Chris Randall/Second Home Studios website http://www.secondhomestudios.com

The character design course is going great and I shall post up some of my recent doodles at the end of the week.