Adding a crew to Kathleen will add a bit of life, a moving model boats looks like a ghost ship without figures. Finding 1:24 scale figures isn't too difficult but they tend to be made from resin or plastic and you need to tweak them into the pose you want. I have made many pose-able armatures for stop motion figures and so it made sense to make pose-able armatures for Kathleen's crew. First you need the right height which is between 65mm and 75mm.
I then made a wire frame using solder wire which I bound in places with brass wire. Once I made the frame I filled it out with more solder wire. the armature is now ready for coating with a latex build up then clothes which I will make from tissue paper.
The finished crew member posing for the camera.
The following stages show how he was made.
The basic wire armature.
The filled out frame.
You can now pose the figure
He's waving!
He even has a head!
The figure is then coated with latex and clothed using tissue. I will post the finished figure soon!
Here is a larger figure I made using wire and brass, this one is 1:6 scale and was used in a stop- motion short.
The armature under clothes, instead of latex build up I've used foam.
Ready to hold any pose.
On set.
You can watch a video clip of the puppet in action here:
A finished film I made using puppet wire armatures.
THE CREW.
The first crew member will be based on the one of the crew to Tommy Jewell who skippered and owned Kathleen and May in the 1950's.
Iv'e chose this era because the boat still looked quite Edwardian and also because I love what the crew were wearing in the 50's
Tommy Jewell
The crew member i am modeling.
I love the berry ,baggy clothes and shirt creases.
Unpainted crew member
Striking a pose, fore-arms and hands to be finished.
Having a seat.
With finished hands and fore-arms.
All done and painted, I've kept the detail simple, the latex makes for a very glossy finish which I'll dull up later with a mat varnish.
Luckily I had an old box brownie with out of date colour film in my wardrobe so we can compare the model to the real guy fairly well :)
And finally ( I promise ) having a row.
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