What materials do you use for shadow puppets?
Well, if you’ve checked out my free shadow puppet pattern, you may already have some ideas on what the answer to this question is: but, I’ve actually used some materials in that tutorial that is not good for making sturdy puppets. Please note: the following discusses modern methods, and not traditional ones. I will discuss that as a footnote, but this mainly deals with materials you can use at home.
To start off with, you should be using some cardboard for the actual puppet: it needs to be thick enough to be sturdy, yet flexible. Don’t ask me what the gsm (measurement of thickness) is, but I’ve been using something that’s about a few millimetres (about 0.1 inches) thick. Why cardboard? It stands up to the rigours of performance, it’s cheap and easy to come by, it’s simple to use, and you can make repairs easily by just making a new part. In terms of colour, you can use traditional black, but really, since the cardboard isn’t transparent, the shadow will appear black anyway (try using white cardboard, it works just the same as black!).
To make coloured shadow puppets, you can use theatrical lighting gel (try Rosco.com for examples), which is a thick plastic, much like cellophane only sturdier, more expensive, and more durable - gels can withstand a lot of heat from theatrical lights, but also come in huge rolls and a range of colours.
You can also paint translucent plastic, like those used for overhead projectors: many puppeteers use overhead projectors as their lighting/staging set up, and this is a simple and easy way of making scenery too… even creating fancy effects simply. By drawing snowflakes on a clear plastic sheet, and drawing it from top to bottom of the projection screen, you can make a snowing scenario. [More on shadow puppet scenery to be added in separate post]
For rods, bamboo or pine dowel makes for good handles, and by inserting a length of wire (I use coathanger wire) into the dowel, you have a good sturdy rod. Be sure to superglue the wire into the dowel.
As for joints, you can see in my video on making shadow puppet joints, there are a number of methods. A simple and cheap method is to use brads, but this isn’t exactly child friendly. Nor is the copper wire method child friendly. String joints are, but require a steady hand. Whichever method you choose, you still need to attach them to the puppets. You can do this in a variety of ways, one of which is shown in my patterns; attach rods using small pieces of copper wire to ‘thread’ the rod to the puppet.
Traditionally speaking, shadow puppets have been made using animal hide, hardened and strengthened into a translucent sheet. It is then cut out, painted, and jointed using wire or string; rods are attached by ’splitting’ them midway and slotting the puppet within the two halves, or by jointing them to the puppets using wire.
How to make a shadow puppet screen is discussed here; free patterns are here; making shadow puppet joints can be found here; how to make a shadow puppet is here AND here. Puppets and patterns are on sale here!
… This post AKA materials to design shadow puppets, AKA materials needed to make a shadow puppet, AKA best material for shadow puppets
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