Talking Heads Coroplast Project - Plywood/Coro Cutouts. Read Only. No more posting. - PlanetChristmas! Forums. Read Only. We've moved to http://talk.planetchristmas.com - The Forums of PlanetChristmas have moved to http://talk.PlanetChristmas.com
For our display in 2007, I wanted to introduce some "talking head" animated figures for some fun effects. I learned a lot along the way, got some good advice from Mr. Marty Slack (thanks Marty!), and had fun building the figures with my son Brandon...
So if you're interested in something similiar, here's the method I used to build them with some photos and a few tips....
First, I thought I'd build two figures. One of myself and one of my son Brandon. The goal would be to have us "talk" to each other during the show with announcements, humor, etc. After doing some measuring outside where they will be mounted, I started to design the heads for an ultimate coro size of 42" square for each head.
So I grabbed a couple of photos from our collection that I thought would do the trick (with us at an angle so it looks like we're talking to each other). The first thing I did was project the photos on a flat surface and trace the main features on large pieces of paper....
The paper copies of the photo traces looked like this....This photo is of me....
One of the tips that I got from Marty was a technique to use so I could see the animation and how the mouth movements would look.
I put my camera on a tripod and took a photo of the "undoctored" figure. Then I taped over a new drawing of the mouth in the "open" position and took a photo of that with the camera in the same place on the tripod.
Then I put the photos on my computer and alternated back and forth between them to see how the mouth woulod look when opening and closing.
I made more adjustments to my drawings to get them where I wanted them to be....Worked like a charm! I used some white-out to clean up the drawings and then moved on to the next step.
This tracing is what Brandon's figure looked like....I had some trouble with his mouth area and taped some new paper over and redrew...I was also experimenting with what it would look like when his mouth opened and closed (per my statement above)....A little more white-out and were were ready to proceed.
Next I purchased two 4' x 8' sheets of white 4mm coro from a local plastics dealer for $13 per sheet. I wanted to have some extra leftover for future projects. I used a jig saw to cut out the 42" squares for each of our figures.
Then I taped the traces onto the rear of the coro and outlined each spot where I was thinking of placing a mini light.
Notice the double traces around the mouth, chin, and dimple(!) area for me. This is what gives the illusion of motion or talking when using LOR (more about that later).
Also note that this tracing is taped on the "Back" side of the coro, so the image is reversed. I used a standard Sears scratch awl that comes with their screwdriver sets to punch the holes in the coro (see photo of that below). No drilling required(!). You definitely want to punch through from the rear since the "outie" will be in front and it's perfect for inserting the lamp from behind. The lamps are standard Target minis and fit very firmly...In fact, if you needed to remove any of them (like I did a couple of times), it took a whole lot of pressure from the front to back them out. I thought the bulbs might break from all the pushing, but they didn't. So these babies aren't going anywhere.
Once the spots were marked on the paper for the lamps, I started the tedious process of punching each hole with the awl. There were times when I made a few adjustments and deviated from the markings, but it worked out pretty well. My goal was to keep the lines straight when necessary, and curved where they should be.
Once the holes were punched, then I started the process of inserting lamps into the holes from behind. There are 3 LOR channels used for each figure, the first channel is used to light the majority of the lamps (head outline, face features like eyes, ears and upper lip). Channel 2 lights the upper lip and upper chin, and channel 3 powers the lower lip and lower chin. So channel 1 is on all the time when the figure is lit up, and channel 2 is also powered on when the figure is not talking. Then you alternate between channel 2 and 3 to make the figure appear to "Talk"...
It took 2 and 1/2 strings of 100 lamps for channel 1, and 50 lamps for channel 2 and channel 3. There were some lamps left over in each set, and I covered those with black tape later and attached them to the back with tie wraps.
My fingers were sore after inserting all the lamps...
Next came Brandon's figure. I could see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel, so this one seemed to go a little bit faster. Mine was done in green lights, and I used red lights for Brandon. A little testing proved that all the lamps were working...
After that, I took a break and then we recorded some announcements so I could try my hand at programming. We knocked off 4 announcements, and I did the programming pretty quickly. Once you get the hang of it, the programming really just ends up toggling channel 2 and 3 on and off in time with the voice. Version 1.6.1 of LOR came in real handy with the waveform display(!)...
And, finally, here's a photo of the finished product all lit up. I'll post some video when I get a chance...
Things I learned through the process:
* Be mindful of the orientation of your figures when tracing (front, back, etc.). You can either do the initial tracing backwards so it can be applied to the back of the coro, or else just do a trace through on the paper and reverse the image later (like I did).
* Drilling these holes would have taken a whole lot longer, and they probably wouldn't have come out as nice as they did with my Sear's awl. It works well for mini-lights, you may have to do some checking for LED's or lamps with a different diameter.
* I still have to build some sort of frame for the figures, not sure yet what will look like...
* Coro is pretty tough stuff, I was very impressed. I can definitely see more uses for this material in our display.
* You have to be smart when pushing the wires through the holes in the coro. I started at one end and worked my way through the figure. But there were times when I had to go into a "corner" and I left some empty holes along the way so I could come back out. Otherwise if you don't, then you'll end up with extra lights to tape off.
* White coro definitely shows off the lights and the glow from the base. I was contemplating another color of coro in the beginning, but I'm glad I went with white.
* The total time to do the work outlined in these notes for both figures is about 20 hours, including recording and LOR programming for the 4 announcements. If I was to build two more figures, it would probably take about 8-10 hours...
Here's the photo of the figures lit up. When I took this photo, there were still a few unused lamps in the rear that needed to be taped over. So there are a couple of reflections that are now gone.
I hope you enjoyed my little description of the project, and please let me know if you have any questions....
Here is a picture of the Sear's awl that I used to punch the holes in the coroplast. I went in all the way up to the handle and that is just the right diameter for a tight fit when you insert the mini lights from the rear...They are so tight that there's no way they're coming back out without some major pushing from the front. I couldn't have designed the awl any better for this purpose(!)
On the handle, it says "scratch awl" and also "9 41028 G WF USA"
Another PM with a couple of good questions that I thought others might like to see...
1) How many lights did each head take, and
2) Did you have 50 count lights to use or did you use 100 count minis and just tape off the ones not used?
Good questions...
1) My head took 350 lights (250 for Ch. 1 and 50 each for Ch. 2 and Ch. 3). The other head (my son's) took 300 lights (200 + 50 + 50). I didn't use all the lights in each of the three sets above, so I did have to tape off some lights. But not very many...
2) I only had Target 100 count lights that I bought at 75% off last Christmas, so here's what I did (see photo). A Target set of 100 lights is really 2 sets of 50 that are wired together. In the middle of these two sets, there is one (and only one) place between lights #50 and #51 where they are connected by two wires. In all the other connections between lights, you'll see more than two wires.
It's okay to cut the wires in that one spot between #50 and #51 to make two sets of 50 lights. You just have to protect the ends - I use heat shrink tubing and uneven cuts between the two wires to keep them protected and away from each other. Then I use black electrical tape to tape off the unused lamps and tie wrap the "hunk" to the rest of the wires on the rear to make a nice little package...I'll also attach a photo of that as well below.
Of course, one of the downsides on separating sets of lights like this is that you'll end up with one set that has a female outlet instead of a plug. So some soldering will be in order to either put a plug on or connect at the tail end of another set of 100 to create a 150 count set of minis...
Here's a photo of the rear that shows the extra mini lights at the end of the string and how I wrap them with black electrical tape and then tie wrap the "Hunk" to the wires to keep it safe and secure....More questions? Let me know.....Thanks,
I've done a similar talking head. Mine has several mouth positions for different looks or sounds and words. I did more of a strait on view with a cartoony look. I'll try to take a picture soon to give ya a look.
Brandon and I worked on some 2x4 frames for the Talking Heads today. I set up my table saw and cut a groove 1" from the edge of four 2x4's down the length that was about 1" deep. The idea was for the coro to go inside the groove and then cut four pieces for each head to make the frame with.
So of the 3.5" width of the 2x4, 1" would be in front, and 2.5" would be in the back. That makes the heads stackable without any danger of breaking bulbs...
I had to cut a second groove just a hair to one side of the first groove to make it wide enough for the coro to fit (the thickness of one saw blade isn't thick enough).
I measured, cut, sanded, and prepped the pieces. Then I screwed the pieces together and then painted three sides today.
Here's a photo of Brandon standing in between the finished products....One more coat of paint tomorrow, and we should be done....
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