Captain Flint

Writer and Illustrator Nelson has provided animationtoolkit.com with a great blog on creating one of his new characters, Captain Flint - utilising the Armature FX kit. Although Nelson is not an animator he is a fantastic model and armature maker. His work and pictures on the site are quite inspiring. I truly encourage anyone interested in armature making to check out his work here.  

Ahoy! Captain Flint is underway! - By Nelson

So, I was sponsored by www.animationtoolkit.com who kindly gave me the armature and said 'have a play, see what you come up with'. Well, it wasn't too hard since Flint was next on the list.

I was impressed with the quality of the screws and bolts actually… for a very reasonable entry into armatures, the components seem to be the same as the expensive stuff… (for Ambrosia I 'splashed' out £12 for one bolt from the Macinnon & Saunders folks, but that was so I could compare my work to Roary, Fifi, etc) I think this set is around £20… I didn't use the armature wire though. It was thicker than my other stuff, and I already had a plan in mind for the legs which we'll look at later…

Captain Flint step 1

I Quickly assembled the armature - gripping a length of wire between a pair of pliers and twisting it around and around to make the wire for the limbs stronger and firmer. snip snip, screw screw, and he's stood up.

captain flint step 2

Aaaaaand, then I disassembled him when I realised i hadn't made the arms long enough to link in with the hands Doh!

Aaaaaand, then the hips and shoulders were the wrong way round since I wanted his body to be a sort of oval shape <facepalm>

- 3rd time lucky, here he is the right way up, with nice long arms to join those hands to :)

captain flint step 3

MAKING WIRE ARMATURE HANDS

firstly, take a piece of wire about 2 foot long. Fold it in half and squeeze the middle together, this will become your middle finger, it's best to work outwards from the middle to try and keep a decent amount of spare wire left at the ends of the hand.

captain flint step 4

Take the pliers and firmly hold the wire down the length of the finger and then twist until nice and tight (the end needs a final pinch again) and then repeat for the next finger…

Take great care that you pinch EXACTLY where you would like the next finger to end, since that will determine the length of the finger. Look at your own hand for reference. It took me four goes to get the proportions right to get the doubled wire in the correct place to ensure firm and strong fingers (you don't want just one wire to be the support for articulation since it's likely to snap, and these fingers are the trickiest bit to do by far).

Take your time, make gentle twists and keep going until you have the four fingers done. If it goes wrong, you're best starting over from scratch as you want nice, tidy twists for strength and durability.

Next twist the two long lengths of wire once or twice to firm up the preliminary wrist area, and take the (longest) wire and wrap it inbetween the finger knuckles. go in-between the all fingers leaving a slight extention each time to form the palm until you get to the thumb area and simply repeat the finger process for the thumb.

Now loop the other wire through these new palm loops once or twice (like a loom), and once or twice around the thump and index finger. Finally back through the palm with both wires to get the hand and the 'arm'. Trim the excess wire as necessary, but make sure to leave enough to be able to join this to your armature too.

Captain Flint step 5

Repeat for the other hand - Don't worry about which hand is left or right since the fingers can be bent over either way after the hand is complete, but do check each finger length against the other hand to ensure they are even.

THE BODY

I used FIMO PUPPEN for the body and head. This stuff is simple enough to use, and there are loads of places to get it from and demos online. My top tips are use a clean sheet of paper to roll your stuff on to keep it free from dirt and debris from your modelling table.

captain flint step 6

The head was simply rolled out and smoothed off by hand, but since the body was thicker and larger, I scrunched up a chunk of tin foil and then wrapped the FIMO around it… into the oven on 130 degrees for 20 mins and done.

captain flint step 7 Captain Flint

 I sliced the body in half down each side so I could house the armature inside (and it's a handy way of accessing it if the armature comes loose or needs repair).

captain flint step 8

 Just cut out any excess FIMO with a craft knife to get a comfortable fit.

Captain Flint step 9

Don't glue it together just yet. It's likely you'll think of something else, or maybe need to adjust other things as you go along. An elastic band (or bit of animation wire) will hold it firm enough to handle for now. He's taking shape!

Captain Flint step 10

 

AHOY! YE BLAGGARDS!!

Captain Flint step 11

 
The Captain roared at all his crew,
And with a mighty "Aaargh!"
Set sail! Ye dogs, be straight and true,
Ye filthy scum, ye blaggards!

More Later!

Nelson.

Nice work Nelson, great account of what you have been up to!  (Wes)