My Latest Idea: A Puppet Show

Yeah, so...

2005-09-25T14:08:00.000-07:00

It's been a while but I got distracted. I've got stuff and I'm gonna put it where you can see it. It will be fun and soft. That is my promise.

things are getting good

2005-07-12T23:28:00.000-07:00

Oh yes. I'm working on the next generation of sock puppet multimedia internet entertainment. Believe you me, when this baby squirts out onto your computer you will know it. Over a dozen new videos are being edited as you read this. Stay with us, we shall not disappoint.

of shacks and sheds

2005-05-16T20:45:00.000-07:00

Right-click the image above and save the target to your machine to view the new puppet show. I've got an idea for the next one so please start holding your breath. Now.

how many of us have them there?

2005-05-09T21:31:00.000-07:00

Thanks to my soon-to-be-related-to Peat, we've got video undergoing the editing process for my next feature. We had indirect lighting with foam core reflectors, tripods, ironing boards, pilsners, the whole nine yards out makin' this happen. I fear this one will be a tad longer than the last so you'll have to drink some coffee or something after pressing play. VannyG laid down some voice action which officially moves this out of the narcissistic panopticon I like to call "Dal" and into the world of collaborative group-hug-think.

As a lovely parting gift (for a recent parting I engaged in) from my comrade Michelle, future features will be brighter and snugger than ever before! The world simply loves puppets and the skin-soft closeness of a 35 threadcount sock. When you can feel the excitement like the impression left by a cast iron 10-speed bike seat, you know a puppet show's a-comin'.

where is this magic?

2005-04-28T20:55:00.000-07:00

Turkeys are like puppets because they have big round bodies and small heads and they waddle. Imagine stumbling upon a herd of Dodo birds - they would greet you like tame geese but wouldn't be so rude. That's the way a puppet should come across (at least, at first).

"Oh, just look at those sqeezably soft chubettes! Aren't they like flightless foam-filled doves cooing lovetry to us as we sway in this cool breeze? I'm still woozy from those comfort foods at supper...but maybe in the morning I'll see how much Dodo I can push into my mouth. Sigh."

The land of plenty. Paradise, really. Eden. In those lands, or stages as I see them, the differentiation between baby and booby isn't obvious or desired. Just the indulgence in shapes, sounds, and textures that connote satisfaction. In as much as the act of cherishing coy cherubs can be compared to hugging as many jumbo balloons to yourself as possible in a peach-perfumed anti-gravity room, I see the role of tactilely suggestive puppets as calling out of us those moments of ecstatic enmeshment we return to (or long to) in so many ways: imaginatively, drunkenly, hysterically.

"I like the way that puppet appears to feel..."
"Yes, it does, doesn't it?"
"What?"
"Oh, you meant..."
"I don't know what I meant now."

The 8th of 7 possible futures

2005-04-25T20:36:00.000-07:00

A writer writes. What does a puppet do? And what of the puppetarians who silently pray for the wiggling sock? I hear them the same way a cat hears a can opener.

One of the interesting strands I've found during this sojourn of the supple is how the hand is used for invisible purposes. It is probably most effective at these. You've heard the saying about how you form a unbreakable bond with whomever you've shaken a hand with...something like how a spider leaves a trail of web wherever it walks or a slug leaving goo like the big, wet, dragging tongues that they are. There are also gestures that are meaningful (think of the beckoning waves of the hula or Mr. Spock) and touches that reach out beyond their gratifying immediacies (like casually rubbing the belly of an infant while it guzzles or the "finishing touch" a poet makes when she finally lifts her pencil).

Wagging a plump sock in front of camera does more than pleasure the viewer with a cascade of endorphans, it stirs the cocktail of expectations and secrets that keeps interest coursing through the present and moistens the lips that purse against future pricks.

and another thing

2005-03-23T21:46:00.000-08:00

It's dawning on me as I create my little cotton community that artifacts like these are how others piece us together (our buttons and felt). These forms can be sensed and attempts can be made to put them into context(s) by onlookers; any forms, really: things you say, how you smell, how long guck stays on your keyboard, what features your puppets don't have, and so on.

And while it (identity) feels like a self-transparent stream that courses up and down our necks babbling and cooing and hating and joking, it's really more like a clothes-line (it seems to me) with its danglings getting pulled across the yard by someone you can only see out of the corner of your eye. A familiar someone but not familiar enough.

The internal experience consists of artifacts, too. Only they may or may not become publicly available depending on how badly they want to be said or done. So, the clothes-line stretches from within the house to out in the yard and I stand between the French doors attaching or removing shirts, pants, pillowcases as the speed of the line allows. Sometimes a soiled garter or a sweaty jock squeaks by and all I can do is hope the neighbors are watching TV or something. "Never you mind these inopportune stains, Chester. You don't want me to call the cops on that damn dog of yours, right?"

In this way, the puppets displayed are really the puppets disclosed. They were news to me too but the kind of news you share, important news. Not the "hey man, you got a serious booger" news that is highly valuable but hoarded like rare sticky opals. So, the external and externalized artifacts that can be assembled by others in their own way about you may be more revelatory than any satori achieved at the corn chip-scented foot of some sage. The self as a collaborative creation (our buttons and felt) - my socks, your chaps, makin' love.

the psalm at the end of the hind

2005-03-14T21:29:00.000-08:00

Explorations of character can lead us down through unexpected trenches. The butt crack of the psyche harbors many a crooked thought. No one wants to be confronted by their musky lusts yet, especially with regard to the unconscious psyche, absence makes the fart grow stronger and slips of the tongue slither out when we least expect it. Our chagrins crust up our avenues of expression which is a fate I must accept as I answer this call to puppetry. Each shape and color, every bob and weave, each chirp and grumble discloses the disavowed intentions that course through my creative cumpulsions. Only after the compositions have been made public, like a rumor about a San Francisco emergency room visit overheard in the women's restroom, do we see what motive forces were at work. But the salt pillars of regressive reflection are not our fate. We rinse the rice again and again and again. Each puppet show is a text to be re-read within the receding expanse of personal history, enriching the readings as it will by turns of sentimentality, desperation or rapprochement.

Feel the rhythm

2005-03-02T21:05:00.000-08:00

Yes, well, it's a hard life. There have been interruptions. However, I do have the script written and materials in hand. I'm hoping time will make herself available that I might answer her beckoning with soft novelty and color. Did I mention that I need to buy three more sets of lights just to materialize these miracles of imagination spitting and spilling from the ruby-tipped wand wagged fiercely by my hot, thick inner magician? This kind of sporadic emergence of inspiration just floods my mind with the magma-fueled intensity of a Wyoming geyser.

Damn, I need to get my hands on some puppets. And how.

The spoils

2005-02-23T21:04:00.000-08:00

Well, now that we've got the sewer line replaced I can go back to work in the basement. Thank goodness that our homeowner's insurance will cover the majority of the cost. I suppose that if I were to ever sustain an injury to my puppet materials they would be covered as well. I would certainly enjoy filling out that form:

20 yards misc colored felt
607 pairs of baby socks
1300 pairs mens tube socks
41,762 plastic buttons
313 meters black thread
1 frozen turkey (with giblets)

Bring out the real you

2005-02-17T22:42:00.000-08:00

Perhaps I could create an offshoot website that just features glamour shots of the more photogenic puppets (like this one Vanny made). Puppeteers could don the socks and autograph the photos e.g. “Best Wishes, Black Dress Sock With Purple Felt Hair.” Although it would be important for the pictures to be tasteful and I should probably steer clear of any boudoir-stylings lest I inadvertently foster some underground pornuppet movement.

Luckily, I have to have our house’s sewer line replaced so I’ll definitely be keeping the experiments on the cheap for the time being. I’m wedged in nicely between the Scylla and Charybdis ass cheeks of economic necessity and artistic compulsion. It’s as if the plump, filthy rats of fate have been whittling their eager fangs on the aging cement drain of my creativity allowing the curious roots of home-owning obligations to thrive and entwine in the rich vein of my muse’s gushing poop and pee.

On that note, be sure to check out my Kemo Sabe Dave’s blog. Whereas some walk the talk, he takes the cake.

hurdling the unhurdlable hurdles

2005-02-15T22:09:00.000-08:00

Well, here it is. I would recommend downloading the movie (right-click on the picture and choose Save As...) as opposed to trying to just watch it. It's 97 seconds of pure joy, really.

Through the process of creating this thingy, I've learned that I'm not born to do this sort of thing but that it is never-the-less possible to do. So now I must create another little proof of concept movie which will demonstrate how I can use chroma key or "blue screen" techniques to enrich the environs of my little puppet friends. If I can pull that off, I will start to get very serious about the next steps.

My vision encompasses the talents of a few weird friends.

Yes, you.

Hey, aren't those t-shirts?

2005-02-12T22:32:00.000-08:00

Yes, indeed. It turns out that hanging these splayed t-shirts from a free-standing curtin rod managed to calm the twin head telescoping halogen worklights I setup in our computer room for to light-up my latest puppetations.

I managed to capture the live video and image stills I needed but now I have to do the editing. This is usually the hard part because you have to watch the clips a million times but I'll just say that I had a plenty hard time just trying to get the lighting into decent shape. I still have a lot to learn about how to light this stuff. And I should probably try to do this in a larger area - a 5x7 floorspace is a considerable constraint.

The limits of dexterity

2005-02-10T21:52:00.000-08:00

Sewing buttons on those little puppets I'm making out of baby socks is a real challenge. I did, however, manage to figure out that if I stick a nice piece of cardboard inside to keep the sock from springing back into shape, it's just a lot easier to sew on a button.

I've managed to scratch down a pretty square idea of a complete puppet/felt/animation combo feature. I think it may weigh in at about 90 seconds all told. Much depends on the availablity of a longish firewire cable and success with lighting. But I'm bullish on success prospects.

I went to the doctor today for the first time in about a decade. Turns out my blood pressure is 140/90 and I'm at my ideal weight. These facts would explain the vitality behind the puppet theatrics; one must be optimally fit, perfect in every way, a veritable David, a Hercules among homunculi to even think about such endeavors.

"Don thy puppet hands, Zeus Moose, and become that who you were ever meant to be. Give rise to the Lazarus felt, shake loose the tube socks from their elastic moorings, and exercise righteous dominion over the very elements as they collide in eternal ecstatic...flippity floo floo. "

It's bed time.

Puppets give voice to unexamined certainties

2005-02-09T22:03:00.000-08:00

My friend Shannon made this little fellow (glamorous yet hairy) at a puppet-making seance we hosted.

The intentional ambiguity above brings those moments of random certainty, like knowing you're in love or the smell of dog crap in your car, into relief; we know who (or that type of person) a given puppet is portraying during a puppet show despite the obvious fact of the portrayal, that is, the concrete presence of an olive dress sock wearing glasses.

That the sock mediates that sense of a certain someone, that it evokes that special intimacy called "memory" due to its likeness over and against the fact that the person (or type of person) it is like is not a sock at all but a human seems ok not to think about (meaning accepting the person/sock ambiguity unexamined so the chickens can be fed and the kids sent off to school and so on).

But, doesn't the question - "In the very nature of my being, am I more or less present, more or less real, more or less human, than a sock with a red button tongue being forced to imitate others by some dork who has his hand up the sock's ass?" - from time to time rear its ugly head?

Reach out, touch felt

2005-02-07T21:55:00.000-08:00

Now that I've got some felt, I'm playing around with animation. Click the picture to see a QuickTime delight. I think some manner of tasteful yet earthy animation would be a cool combination with the puppets; kind of like the name "Jethro" sounds like something big kids do to little kids on a playground during lunch.

Mother (frightened): "What on earth happened to your turtleneck, Gregory? You look as if you've escaped from a vulture's nest!"

Gregory (quivering, soiled): "J-J-Jethro...y-y-yet ag-g-gain."

2005-02-06T21:57:00.000-08:00

It's not so much that one is confronted with the uncanny but that one must reckon with it; even if new language must be created simply to come to terms with the experience.

2005-02-05T17:43:00.000-08:00

To record the puppet show I'm using an Optura Pi and PowerShot both by Canon.

From troglodyte to acolyte at the speed of ideation

2005-02-03T22:24:00.000-08:00

Who doesn’t love a story illustrated by felt? I haven’t seen one in years but I have resolved to use this art form within the puppet show. I’m hoping the same kind of fourth grade dexterity I weathered at the time (rounded scissors and all) is all that's still required these days. Rough approximations of structures, birds and smoke placed carefully on a vibrant backdrop should breathe life into this baby.

You really can’t escape the tactile presence, the Van Gough-ness of a felt mountain or shoe. It makes you smack your inner lips and salivate with sympathy for that awkward youth shying away from destiny while behind him the sun is peeled off the Robin's egg sky and replaced by an amber crescent moon gently smoothed into place.

And they should serve wine at these felt-backed productions so the warmth of the felt is welcomed by a well-lubed conviviality.

“Hey lady! Put that soldier back up there, I wanna see him bite that tiger on his goddamn foot! You take that back up your purple hill, you buck-toothed jerk! And tell your bitch of a step-mom to shut up while you’re up there! I want to see some goddamn justice! Some goddamn justice!”

2005-02-03T21:36:00.000-08:00

My brother-in-law disagrees with the assertion that "the soul is the foundry of the humdrum." I think these squares of (soon to be puppet-worldly) felt offer a second opinion.

The wry air smugs with impunity

2005-02-02T21:35:00.000-08:00

I don't have any truly bright socks. I have some that are lighter than others (plus white) but not socks that beam. If I were watching socks imitating life I would want them to be brilliant. "Now that's the sock that really sucked me in to the story," they'll say when they catch a glimpse of the socks (that I may have to make myself if I can't find any) that of themselves glow with imaginative succulence.

The selection of color implicates the interior life of the one who responds to the appeal the pink or lime or turquoise sock makes. The pleasure that clears vistas for the sock shopper's mind to behold is the coming-to-sensation of a hitherto unconscious connection between desire for colorful sock and men's big yellow sock, for example. Because the pleasing sensation can't be cleaved from the conscious apprehension of the sock itself, they must (for shits and giggles) be, essentially, one. "Sockness" and "puppeteerness" are two perspectives alternately working to explain and to produce evocative dramatizations of human life.

When the puppeteer makes the sock slowly undulate before freezing stiff because another sock portraying the Milkman sees it (through the window) savoring some bathroom floor toenails, the eternal fountain of human virtue is made palpably present (however private or crispy it may be).

2005-02-02T21:34:00.000-08:00

Puppet sample assembled by the neighbor lady for my uses

The problem posed by socks

2005-02-01T21:24:00.000-08:00

I'm definitely leaning toward simple puppets. Let's be clear - I don't know how to make or use puppets so the simpler the puppet the more likely I will be able to wield it. Maybe just socks with buttons for eyes. Simple, classic, elegant. Cheap, fun, cute.

It seems like strong clear dialog is the most important thing about a puppet show. These aren't marionettes where the audience is expecting expertise and life-likeness although the desire for emotional truth must still be nurtured by the sock puppeteer. When people see a sock on a man's hand, they demand emotional truth. Otherwise, they get anxious and wonder what else he might do: something harmful? something erotic? something involving others?

A sock puppet is a special being, it is the creative animation of the mundane for specifically human purposes. Unless, of course, it's being used by someone possessed by an animal or in other ways acting like a crotch-sniffing nest-shitter. Someone everyday, through some synchronistic channel, reminds me that "psychosis deflates the organ inspired and, tired, tongues its tail wetly." Translation: if you're a fanny-nibbling weirdo with big ideas about converting strangers into snot-chewers on my dime, you just keep your poopy paws out of my puppets!

Such dealings add weight to the burdensome mantel of our sock-handed amateur. (He's not heavy, he's my puppet)

2005-02-01T21:21:00.000-08:00

I'm experimenting with supplemental lighting in my basement. Puppet luminescence is a critical platform in my strategy for viewer pleasure.

What the hell is wrong with people?

2005-01-31T18:03:00.000-08:00

My sense of humor is very rude, I think. But I don't generally act it out so that makes me a good person. However, with the prospect of a puppet show the opportunity to be exposed and "for shame"d becomes an impending confrontation.

I mean, listening to deaf people talk can be very funny. They sound retarded sometimes and when they're discussing something seemingly private at high volume and with an atonal sensibiliity it just plain tickles me. That makes me a turd in the eyes of god, I know, but darn it if it ain't the Truth.

The point here being that I have no control over what clowns come spilling out of my muse's Smart Car. I just know I have to replace the air freshener every now and again. I mean, what the hell is wrong with people? Don't they ever giggle at politically incorrect shit?

I've now thrown down the tartlet

2005-01-30T01:12:00.000-08:00

My plan is to post status and stories and stuff here loosly associated with my latest idea - creating a puppet show. Let's be clear: I don't know how to do this but I'm willing to figure something out. So far, I know I want to make sock puppets and stick my hands in them. I think I will use our basement to build the stage and rehearse. Yes, I've taken the tartlet and thrown it down: a challenge to all you pastry-faced nay-sayers. Next time you cross me, you might as well bend over and grab a whiff of my soiled tartlet. And later while you're picking and eating the resultant boogers of truth know that, even later, you will be pooping them out as sticky little tartlet truth turds.