Puppit Productions Firefox W.I.P

Dear everyone,

after a long hiatus I've finally started working on a new doll. Her character is going to be a sexy, powerful firefox. I'd like to make her body a perfect anthropomorphic mix of fox and human.
After some sketching I decided to give her interchangeable heads: One human, one fox.
So far so good. However, I'm having trouble with the legs:

Foxes are plantigrade (they walk on their toes).


It's no problem to "merge" a human's leg with a fox: When you make the foot longer and let in stand on the toes, it looks fine (not my 3D model, but the best example I could find without having to scan drawings):


But this is highly unstable. Even when the legs are completely stretched, with "blocked" joints. There's simply not enough surface.
And placing the foot flat on the ground looks ridiculous (it's like she's wearing clown shoes, and her legs would appear too short). And since she's mostly a fox, high heels will look out of character.

Do you guys have any idea how I could solve this? I would prefer for her to be able to stand up straight on her rear legs, not just on four feet... And I'd rather not give her human feet or cartoonesque tubby claws...

 

...
THE TAIL 0.0
Mayor brainwave here.
Since she's a firefox she's going to have at least one tail, I was still working on how I could fit more... But I planned on making them jointed. THEY CAN SERVE AS EXTRA SUPPORT.
PROBLEM SOLVED.
I can't believe I didn't think of that before... :dead

Apart from that: Thanks so much for the link! I rather like the hands, and it's nice to see how they made the joints. The rest is not my style at all (why on earth is she pointing her tail upwards?? And what's with the HUGE ears?!)... But the feet indeed weren't as cartoonesque as I had pictured. They're still a bit plump for something that's intended to be as elegant as a fox, but they could work quite well for a wolf or something.

Thanks so much, I'm going to sketch for a bit and see if a long tail doesn't look too weird. Normally it should touch the ground if a fox were to stand on his rear legs, so it should work.

It seems I can't change the title myself somehow... So if some moderator could change it for me, cutting the last part off so I could still use this thread for updates?
If the title can't be changed it can be closed, then I'll just open another one when it's starting to look like something.

 

Thanks again for the help. I've never been much of a soom fan (They all have such styled "I-am-a-high-elf-move-aside-you-low-mortal" kind of faces, which I usually don't like), and when I searched for pictures Breccia didn't pop up in the search results... But I rather like the clothes and such, so I'll take a look around.

Will put up some scanned sketches here next week (I'm not very good at drawing though :P).

 

Finally made some sketches of my firefox.
I suck at realistisch drawing, but at least it will give you an idea of what she's supposed to look like.
She'll have interchangeable heads and a jointed tail (covered with a "sleeve" of furry fabric) and magnetic ears (possibly flocked). I haven't figured out yet how I can make her have more than one tail, especially since I would prefer it to be reasonably easy to take them off and put them back on again. Any ideas on that?

 

Thanks for thinking along. I would prefer to avoid big paws (see earlier comments), as I am trying to make her as elegant as possible. Plump paws work very well for cute characters, but I'm afraid it would look weird on something supposed to be sexy :P
Besides, I already solved the problem (somehow I couldn't change the last part of the title, very annoying):
She has a floor-length jointed tail, so even if I fail to balance her well enough with tiny paws, the tail will provide extra support. Like a tripod, so to speak :P

I really love your doll though! She looks absolutely wonderful, I love the marbled pattern and her detailed hands an feet. Do her feet have an extra joint in them at the ball of the foot?

 

Coloured the previous sketches. As it looks now I will have to cast her in a more tanned skin tone... I usually like my dolls to be quite pale, but her foxyness doesn't stand out as much when she doesn't have a somewhat red-brown skin. Of course I could always cast a second, snow fox version :P I also realized I should try making gloves for her human form once she's done, and perhaps a nice red evening gown. The ears and tail will be removable, so with a long gown hiding her feet and the gloves hiding her paws she would have perfect human disguise.

(and yes, at the first one I somehow completely forgot you can put the inks in the top layer in Photoshop, so I coloured right over them -.- It does make her look softer, though)

 

How exactly did you make that work?
As far I as I can see on your pictures, there is a pole/rod in her ankle (where one normally attaches the ankle hook to, then hooking the other end to the sting running through the leg). So how did you make that joint in the foot functioning? With an extra piece of string? Or is the pole simply to "guide" the string around the corner, and is the real hook attached in the piece with the toes?

 

Thank you I plan on making her hair and tail as fire-like as possible. I even found some thermally active hair (changes from red to orange when the temperature rises), I hope I can incorporate it into her wig if the quality is good enough.

 

Allright, it took me some time to figure out the issues with the balance and the multiple tails, but I think I solved them (for now - knock-on-wood)... So it's finally time for the actual sculpting!

Some paper cut-out tests, to configure the joints and movement and so on...



The master plan: (mind you, things have a tendency of getting away from me once I start sculpting, so don't look at this like an accurate depiction of what the eventual doll will look like... More like something that is more-or-less vaguely in the direction of what it should become :P)



The first carvings of the base:


I'll keep you updated!

 

Carved the rest of the base and adapted it to the balljoints (or balljoints-to be, right now they're just wooden beads).

 

Forgot to photograph the fox head >.< here you go. With as a special extra, some of my horrible sketches :P

 

Set the whole thing up...

...And covered the whole shebang in the first layer.

 

It's styropor, pretty much the same as regular styrofoam, but it's a little more dense and doesn't crumble as much. I cut it with a handheld hot wire cutter.

 

Attached the joints to their respective limbs (apart from the wrists, those will be attached to the hands later) and put on a second layer.



Now busy building serious muscle and fat to give her the right shapes in the right places.

 

By the power of BEWBS! :XD

 

Which are you looking at, just the parts as they are now or the drawing as well?
I am aware that double elbow joints may take up more space/ be bigger and can therefore seem out of place... But on the other hand I really want her to be very mobile. I was thinking about making the elbow joints a little smaller though. Problem is how to get them perfectly round: I can't find a size that's right in between the current elbow joints and the ankle joints, so I'll have to add a layer of papier-maché to some balls the size of the ankle joints then... Which is a pain to get evenly spread and sanded.

 

@Amily: Thanks!

Progress update:

She's taking shape! Now I just need to... CUT HER TO PIECES! *Cue evil laughter*
No kidding though. I need to separate her pelvis and chest from her belly, which will then become her torso joint(s).

 

More progress pics!
*Frankenstein accent*
After aye cut thie fräulein into pieces...

I took out thie intestines...

...Und mit der help of myne design...

...Habe ich den first steps gemacht für thie making of thie joints von das monster.

Jawohl.

 

Another picture.


I am quite happy with the overall progress, but I'm wondering: Maybe I should make the upper legs a little shorter? They do appear a little larger here because of the camera angle as well, but still... Since her feet will be stretched out to make fox legs, her legs might become too ridiculously long. I like long legs, but she shouldn't became a stilt walker.

 

Busy refining the joints, so they all fit perfectly and look nicer.
Slow progress, taking pictures all the time would be meaningless, so in the meantime, here is some ass to keep you happy:
:P

 

Assembled all unsanded parts thus far for a proportion-test. I put my Dollzone Mo B head on top of the neck, as her own head is still just an egg-shape with a neck-hole in it. Mo is intended for a 65 cm BJD, while Seraphim is about 55 cm, so it's a little too big but it gets the job done.


Here from the side with the base of the fox head. Obviously it still needs several layers of papier-mâché and all details, but at least it gives an idea.


Her joints work quite well, so now all that's left is to sand the whole thing and make her some hands, heads and toes.

 

I've PM'd a moderator to change the title (somehow I can't do it myself), because I think it's obvious I don't exactly have balance problems anymore:


Oh yes. Unstrung, unwired. Just balanced loose parts.
*does little dance of I-rule*

 

Finally started on the face(s)!



Comparing with the sketch:


Her cheeks are obviously too fat now, but the pâpier-maché is still wet here, it will shrink a litte. So when it's dry it should be just about right.

 

Second layer!



Bit of a duckface at the moment, but I need to wait for the lips to dry before I can start working on her cheeks and nose-surroundings (including nose-to-mouth transition) again.

 

Last layer! Now all there's left is a whole bunch of sanding...
And her hands. She doesn't have hands yet.

 

Haha thanks, I did so with me too :P I was sitting at my desk like "Maaaaybe... Maaaaaybe... *pause* Oh man no way! Sweet!" *little dance of joy*

 

Progress has been a little slow lately... The dull weather kind of robs me from my energy and motivation. Especially since my workplace is in the attic, and takes about two hours to warm up a little...

Made the headcap, adjusted the eye shape and evened out the face.
I put a wig on her that is actually for a MSD-sized doll, but since Seraphim is only a small SD and the wig had some stretch, it fitted! Her eventual wig will be gradient, red-orange-yellow for the firefox version, white-grey-blue for the snowfox.


Yes, she doesn't have human ears. She's meant to be a fox, and double sets of ears make no sense.




Thanks to Frankenmar of the Dutch forum, for lending me the eyes! Her eventual eyes will be pretty similar to these, maybe a little brighter - more flame-like.

 

Happy New Year to all you crafty people!
Let's make it a good one.

 

Right, it took me a while after the holidays to get started again, but I'm back to work.
Here are the skeleton and base layer for the hands:

Left:


Right:

 

Toe-parts in the making!


Hands are now done, though unsanded... And I still need to attach them to the wrists:

 

Progress on the toes:

(Somehow this looks rather Tyrannosaurus-y)

 

Yes, that's probably it. I will be adding a "skin and fluff" layer on top of this one, so that should take care of it.

 

Not much furryness yet. I've had it surprisingly tough sculpting the feet... One, I could hardly find good reference pictures (most anatomical drawings were of dog feet, and most fox pictures were of the front paws, not the rear ones). I had to start over 3 times to get the exact shape.
So here are some pictures of the shaping layer. Next one will be the furry one. Gotta use a different material for that, as paper-maché needs to be sanded and isn't suitable for subtle scratchy movements (drawing hair texture). I think I'll use regular non-shrinking, air-drying modelling clay.

 

Those were earlier layers of the human head, but thanks for pointing it out! It's probably because I re-arranged my Photobucket folders. I'll fix it.
Feet just need some furryness now, already sanded the edges of the foot pads. They look much softer now.

 

Furtime! Did some little tests which kind of clay would be best for making the detailed fur on the feet.
I tried epoxy putty (which wouldn't attach itself to the papier-maché), regular pottery clay and polymer clay...
I think it's clear who's the winner:

 

Thanks guys!
Eldurwen, the dark material is epoxy putty (here in "natural" colour, but there are many colours available). Papier-maché alone would break too easily when sanding it later, so I needed a solid base and epoxy is perfect for that.

 

It took a while (agonizing slow progress regarding the hairiness), got bubbles trapped between layers and whatnot, but now the toes, feet and lower legs are done. Also refined the blockade in her ankles: I need her to be able to stand not only with legs stretched, but also with bend knees, like a fox.



Painted and coated the nails so make them more smooth (making very thin, pointy shapes is tricky in pâpier-maché, and it's stronger this way). Sanded the edges of the cushions to make them look softer. The blue bits are the parts where they touch the surface when standing.

 

Oh how I loathe making slots in the joints... And joint-sanding in general, actually, but here they are: Them legs.



They pose and stand quite easily, so I'm really happy. Still need to make the lock in the knees for the "fox-position" (slightly squatting), but I need to finish the rest of the doll to do that, to make sure the balance is right.

Aaaaaand my favourite picture:

Can't wear sexy high heels with fox feet? Pfah! Don't need them!

 

Thanks you guys Your compliments really mean a lot to me.

Here are some new pictures of the sanding progress...


I'm quite happy how the belly turned out. I used belly-dancing pictures as a reference, since I wanted her to be both a bit muscular and luscious.
I know lower back looks kind of odd right now: I deliberately exaggerated the backbone to make it merge better into the tail that will be attached to the bottom part.

 

Attached the wrists to the hands, filed the slot in them and did the first bit of sanding (massive pain in the ***).
Couldn't resist playing "Sistine Chapel" with them.

 

Ah, shoulder plates, my old nemesis...
I LOVE sculpting torso's, but I always have a lot of trouble getting the back right, especially the scapula. The simple reason is that I can't see my own, and I rarely get to see naked girls (I know, big flaw in my life :P). So tons of reference pictures and anatomical drawings will have to do the trick.
Here's Seraphim's back now:


I might sand down the shoulder plates a bit more, they might be a little too pronounced right now.