tutorials

tutorial – making felt finger puppets of well known people

September 16, 2009

This one is so simple and quick, which is the way I like ‘em. All you need is some suitable coloured felt and some thread and scissors. This time the brief was a finger puppet of our own Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, but you can use this for anyone at all. To make a finger [...]

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Tutorial – gold leafing and gold leafing round objects

September 14, 2009

Gold leafing seems pretty tricky, but it’s actually really simple. For the puppet play I’m working on we decided that we’ll copper leaf some sticks, to give them a fancy edge. Which explains the photos You’ll need:gold leaf (or silver or copper or whatever)gold leaf adesive (can be purchased where ever gold leaf is sold)matt [...]

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Tutorial – Real Hands for puppets and puppet suits

April 7, 2009

This is a really simple tute, which as you know, is always my favourite kind. When you’re building a puppet and you need it to be able to actually use it’s hands, then one way to do it is to create what is referred to as “real hands”, which is basically a big glove attached [...]

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Tutorial – Design It Yourself Doll Gift for children

February 22, 2009

When we were little and it was our birthday, our mum would draw up a Breakfast In Bed menu, with everything she could possibly think of, and bring it into our bedroom with a pen. You’d mark off what you wanted for breakfast, and she’d disappear into the kitchen for a bit. Then your chosen [...]

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Tutorial – Dreads (snakes, antennas) for dolls

February 13, 2009

This one is another really dead simple tute (and really, how good are they?) I used it a couple of years ago for the antenna of the robot GIR from Invader Zim, but it’s also worked really well for snakes for a Medusa doll and it’d be great for dreads too. This works best with [...]

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When Craft Attacks…

February 8, 2009

So I had this dream the other night, that I heard about an artist in another town that was making dolls and leaving them around for people to find (al la The Toy Society) and so I went down there to see them. I found a big pile and took two of my favourites, they [...]

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Tutorial: 6 steps to an awesome exhibition

January 17, 2009

This stems from my interview with the great community radio station 3CR. It’s how to curate and organise a well thought out group exhibition, using the internet at almost every stage to facilitate it. Step one: The idea and the research behind it Every group exhibition needs a theme, some kind of idea that ties [...]

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Tutorial – How to publicize your event or exhibition

January 5, 2009

I’m not just a crafty artist, as so many people in this day and age I do many, many things. So one of my plans for these tutorials was always to teach people other stuff that is related to craft and creating but isn’t just sewing, knitting and eating (although these are three of my [...]

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Tutorial – Awesomely Luxurious Doll Hair

January 2, 2009

How do you make good dolls hair? It’s something that I’ve been experimenting with for a while, trying different things and the other day I re-discovered an awesome way to do it. Weirdly enough it was something I first used in about year 7 to make a judges wig from carpet strands. But now, with [...]

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Tutorial – Surprise Piggies

December 21, 2008

And it’s time for another tutorial, working through the last of the props for This is set in the future : Surprise Piggies! I love these guys. They were designed to be thrown through the air, which is why they look so surprised, and thus they’re just constructed of felt and stuffing, there’s nothing hard [...]

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