| An animatronic capuchin puppet is tested on a willing production assistant. We were going for the "monkey on your back" saying. One of the puppeteers (in this case, it's Jim Boulden) is behind the subject with the rod (for the body moves) and another (Dave Kindlan) is operating the monkey's head and face with a radio control unit. There are two sets of arms/hands for this rig. One rig has fully articulated fingers! They can manipulate very tiny things with those hands. The other set are "loose linked" to move as the body moves. This is a traditional "Jim Henson" type puppet set-up.
There are several monkey rigs to choose from (poseable, marionette, posing mouth and versatile).
This is a sample of a radio controlled rod puppet. Here's a "naked monkey" test of the same action. This is without the fur. You can see more of the animatronic framework in action. This video is taken from the "work-in-progress" page for the project. |
