Exterior Sets
I grew up in Idaho. We'd often take long trips through the mountains to visit family. As nature whizzed by, I was fascinated by solitary, broken down buildings. Even though they're sitting in a field all alone, they used to be used for something. I channeled that inspiration with this set. I wanted to make an overgrown, dingy, completely abandoned shed in the middle of a vibrant flower field.
This set was for my debut short film Rusty. Rusty Robot wakes up underground and finds his way outside, where he discovers the fragility and wonder of nature for the very first time. This set was made using wood, foam, plaster, greenery, flocking fiber, tissue paper, push pins, paint, and wire.
Interior Sets
For the scene where Rusty walks up the stairs, I designed a forced perspective set. I wanted the audience to be as unsure about where Rusty is going as he is. I built the stairs out of rigid foam, and then painted the rest. I shot the scene dark so it would look like the stairs go on forever.
Puppets
I designed Rusty the Robot to be kid-friendly and relatable. He's innocent, curious, and unsure of himself. This widely reflects how I felt as a child. His innocence is balanced with being broken down and junky.
The butterfly is much more elegant than Rusty. I modeled it after the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail. I made two puppets at different scale. One large one for closeup shots and a much smaller one for medium shots.
The frog couple below was inspired by a sweet farming couple in my hometown that would gift me veggies out of their garden.
Armatures/Puppet Dressing
Rusty was my first machined puppet. His armature was a lot of trial and error. His armature is made up of ball-bearings, brass hinges, and steel rods. 3D printing proved to be extremely useful for his geometric design. Painted electrical tape created a tubed look on his limbs. His eyeballs fit directly into his eye sockets, held by a little museum wax.
The frogs were made from wire, epoxy, clay, and sports wrap. Their eyes and mouths are replaceable clay pieces, allowing me to change up facial expressions.
The butterflies are made of wire, epoxy, and felt. Their wings are made of paper sheets. Each wing is made up of one white watercolor paper sheet in the middle with light gels glued onto either side. The gels against the white create a brighter color. Then two thin painted papers with holes cut out of them are pasted on top. I cut the wings consistently by tracing. I superglued the wire to the watercolor sheet inside the wings.
Props
Large-scale robot hands were used for closeups with butterfly interaction, and medium hands for closeups without it. They were made with the same process. The palms and knuckles of the large-scale hands are made of lightweight rigid foam, and lightweight air-dry clay. The medium hands were made from sculpey clay.
I particularly enjoyed creating flower props. These were made from the same tissue paper I made the flowers in the field set with, wrapped around a foam ball.