Reynard update, Part 2 (Fur)

Once I had finished the foam part of Reynard, I moved on to the fur. Since I couldn't find a nice reddish-orange at any craft or fabric stores around me, I ended up ordering a few yards from Israel (go figure) on eBay. Add to that the short, black and white fur and the long white fur that I bought at JoAnn's fabrics, and I was ready to go.

Now, I must admit something. I know that it is important and proper in the puppet world to make patterns of what you are doing so that you can recreate or fix it later. I think that's a great idea. However, I don't plan on implementing it in the near future. I work in an organic fashion (it helps allay the brutality of the rigamarole of my day job), and with the limited time that I have, I don't particularly want spend it making patterns. It will someday bite me in the derriere, but I don't really care right now. Instead, I make momentary patterns, use them as I need them, and then toss them. That's exactly what I've been doing with the fur on Reynard.

I started by making pieces that would have the correct lay of fur and pasting them on the fox.

I went next to the ears. Red foxes have a distinctive looking ear: white fur all around the middle, which is darker. I took the longer white fur and cut two pieces that would go on either side of a black stripe.


I then cut out the black back of the ear (which would fold over the white fur).


And, voilà!

I used Prismacolor markers to blend the fur into the ear.

I then put on the white fur for the mouth and added more of the Plasti-dip on the lip.


Once that had dried, I colored the fur and added a few more details. This is how he remains today. I plan to finish work on the eyes (using latex molds and rubber...I've had less than perfect results thus far) and the mouth and nose next. Then I'll go on to the neck and body. Hopefully it won't take quite as long as the head...