EXTRA EXTRA READ ALL ABOUT IT

When we first got into Soft Sculpture, there was something that stood out to us. The only mechanics that were available at the time were fairly scarce and only included the occasional set of Blinkers and some moving eyebrows that just were not that lifelike to us. We were jealous of the hard figures who seemed to have all the choices for movements.

We soon discovered that there were very good reasons for the fact that mechanics were virtually unheard of in soft sculpture. The makers of hard figures had everything working for them. You want a feature…figure it out and anchor it somewhere in the hard structure. Shazam. It would work.

Soft Sculpture is a different world. How do you attach something to soft flexible foam? Not so easy. This began a pilgrimage for us. How do you invent hard anchor platforms where none exist? That one question was almost enough to bring the dream to a stop. And it did. . . for a while. JET put all her concentration on developing her “look” because she did not want to look like anyone else. She was constantly being compared to someone else, and although we had the utmost respect for that maker (who is a friend), she wanted to have her own style without being compared to others. As that goal continued, we had a few good friends like Gary Owen and John Pizzi and others who just would not stop asking for new features. At the same time they continued to ask, they were very encouraging. They believed in JET and for that we owe them a debt of gratitude.

Eventually, we got the mechanics figured out for individual features and over time worked the little bugs out of them. We got the Eyebrows (they had been done before). Then we got the Blinkers, (they had also been done before). The Moving left to right Eyes were not so simple which explained why nobody had done them before in a traditional ventriloquist puppet. Then came the real roadblock. Moving eyes and blinkers in the same puppet was as near to impossible as we had encountered because we had to leave room inside the head for the Vent’s hand. It all had to be workable. NOT!.

Still the requests came from JPZ and others. No solutions could be found. Finally we began to think. Since so many Vents wanted to stay with their hard figures there must be a reason for it. Even though several voiced to us that they really loved the look of Soft Sculpture, they simply wanted to keep the headstick controls.

The light came on and the experiments began. Far more failures than successes. What continued to drive us was the number of people who said it could not be done. One thing about JET. If you want her to do something, tell her not to do it.

Well after hundreds of failed attempts and mountains of wasted bits of metal and foam, we would now like to introduce you to “Sherman” our first conventional headstick “Soft Sculpture Stick Puppet”.

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Sherman is a 36″ tall full Soft Sculptured “Figmy” (Figure Dummy) with a traditional head stick. As far as we know he is the first of his kind. Sherman has Moving Mouth with mouth in the closed position. He also has left to right moving eyes. He is a one-of-a-kind as are all of JET’s creations. Although we can do similar Figmy’s, they will all have a different look unless the original owner of record requests a duplicate Figmy. Watch the short video showing his movements.

 

For more photos, see Sherman in the new “Available Now” section on our website (click here) or his listing on http://www.ventriloquistmarketplace.com/

As a special introductory offer, we will give free shipping anywhere in the world (where geo-political conditions permit) to the new home of Sherman. Sherman is $1,070.00 delivered to your location. If you are interested in Sherman or if you would like to order a custom figure to your specifications (with or without headstick) drop us a line at thedummyshoppe@gmail.com.

Don’t worry, we are not changing anything that we have done before, we are just adding the Figmy’s as a new alternative for those that want them.

Please give us your comments.

4 thoughts on “EXTRA EXTRA READ ALL ABOUT IT”

  1. What can I say other than congrats to JET for finally combining the two styles into one. I truly think you have hit a home run and want to wish you all the most success possible with this new style ventriloquist figmy.

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