As it turns out, much that I thought was clay is actually foam laytex. For example, the puppets on MTV’s Celebrity Deathmatch looked just like clay, but they are actually foam puppets made from a mold. The artist who created most of those puppets, Kathi Zung released a DVD that explains the whole process. ( http://www.angelfire.com/anime4/zungstudio/ ) Aardman, the guys who created “Chicken Run” and “Wallace and Gromit” creates foam puppet bodies and then uses plasticene, a type of modeling clay that doesn’t dry out, for the hands and heads. Foam has several advantages over clay. It retains its shape, so there is no need to resculpt between frames. It is not as heavy as clay, so the armature isn’t strained and it’s easier to animate. Foam doesn’t get as dirty as clay can get - it just looks cleaner. Of course, with clay you can achieve more dynamic movement - it’s maleable. Some characters, like blobby, transforming characters need to be created in clay. It’s also much easier to build a clay puppet. No messy chemicals to fuss with or molds to create. To generalize, clay puppets are easier to make and harder to animate. Foam puppets are difficult to make and easier to animate.

I’ve been thinking a lot about this. I believe that for my story, I will build a foam puppet. This is a scary undertaking for me. I’m not especially crafty with my hands, nor handy with tools. I figure that after a few puppets, that should change.

The process of creating a foam puppet is fairly well documented on the web, I think. There are also a few good books that discuss the process. Incidentally, this is the same process that movie effects studios use to create various props, and that Henson uses to create puppets. I’m chomping at the bit to get started on learning such a cool artform.