Kermit the Frog here! V2 finished. V1 patterns posted!

[bk85]

I did a quick foam mockup of the body last night. I decided to kinda go back to the drawing board and just use the one symmetrical curve "back" shape that I created and make an entire body out of that. I would then go through and trim/slice/add as needed. This was much easier in foam than it was when I tried to do the same adjustments in paper.

Some of the cues that I'm keeping in mind is that the back has a symmetrical arch top to bottom. Also, the bottom half of the front arch seems to match the bottom half of the back arch, so if you were to cut Kermit in half horizontally, it would be a perfect bowl shape. The top half of his front is what changes things. It's a bit flatter, with a much more gradual arch going from collar bone area to belly. Since 75% of the body seems to be the same leaf pattern as the back, that's why I started with just the one simple shape repeated 8 times.

Here is the general pattern that I started out with. This is only half of the pattern. When tracing on the foam, I just flipped it on one edge so that there were 8 side by side leaves/petals.

I then glued the edges together, giving me this shape.

Now it was time to get to work on his chest. I figured that the easiest way to do this was to cut the top halves of the 2 frontmost leaves and replace them with another shape. I went with a trapezoid. For this early trapezoid insert, I just kept the same top/bottom widths from the shape that I cut out, as my original intention was just to remove the bulk that the curve of the leaves add and replace with a straight line.

Cut body and new trapezoid insert.

Once I glued that into place, I realized that the bottom measurement was a bit too narrow. That's ok for this mockup since the foam is very forgiving when the edges meet, but it did yield a bit of puckering along the bottom line. I'll "fix it in post" when I clean up the pattern in Illustrator.

I could tell that the chest was still much too bulky. Kermit has neglected chest day for a while, so it needed to be much more modest. To fix this, I basically just made the top of the trapezoid narrower, while keeping the bottom the same. I did this by cutting an inverted triangle wedge from either side. Ignore the inverted triangle marker line, as I was originally going to cut bulk out of the middle before I decided to do it at the edges.

I did one more trim of the chest and then cut out the curve that allows the back of the neck to slope down towards the front. The overall middle was also a bit too curved, so when I pattern out the mockup in Illustrator, I'll narrow the width of the shapes just a touch. The puckering that I mentioned before also caused the belly to be a bit too sharp, but that'll get fixed also. I also think that because I used a bit more glue than was needed, it made the joins harder than the foam which made the joins a bit pointed and less flexible. I also trimmed about 1/3" from the bottom as the bottom hole wasn't large enough for my forearm.

Now I went back to my starting pattern and made some adjustments based on measurement from the foam. The green lines were the starting pattern, the grey lines are just there for easier snapping of vertices, and the red lines are my modification outlines.

That yielded this pattern, which I will try out later today. Fingers crossed!

 

[GamerMechanic81]

That would be the dream! If I ever move back into a 2 bedroom, I could totally imagine having a row of Kermits through the years sitting atop a wall of bookshelves in a home office. I have a loooooooong way to go before I'm good enough at replicating the nuances. This page is a pretty cool, simple breakdown of the major changes over time. It would be awesome to have 1 of each. Kermit the Frog Through the Years


Thanks for making the scan and pointing me to it!! I used my extremely rudimentary skills in blender to try and take some measurements, but didn't have a lot of luck getting the tool to snap to the points. I did get a few though, and (assuming my measurement attempts were accurate) it pretty much confirmed some of the measurements out there. 3.5" width for the mouth plate, about 7 inches for the body height, etc. so it seems like some of the key measurements I've gleaned from the community or extrapolated myself have been pretty on point

Did a little digging online. Apparently the one I scanned dates to 1969 and was primarily used for Sesame Street.

Kermit the Frog and Friends Join American History Museum's Collections

Though puppeteering genius Jim Henson has gone from this earth, he is still with us by way of his creations

www.smithsonianmag.com

 

[bk85]

I am pleased to report that I think the new pattern did the trick! Once I printed/cut the pattern, I did notice a glaring issue that I had to fix real fast. My slope wasn't right toward the front. Since the trapezoid shape has a longer side line than the abutting curved line, it made the top of the trapezoid about 3/16" too tall. Since the top of the trapezoid was a core measurement, I had to adjust the angle/heights of the sloping lines so that it would line up correctly. While I was in there I undid a slight modification I did on a whim earlier too. When first modifying the original pattern in Illustrator, I decided to curve the side of the trapezoid ever so slightly but that would have undone some of the progress I made so while I was adjusting the slope, I got rid of the curve.

Anyway, this is what I got out of my V2.1.2 pattern. I am super happy with how it came together! It has the silhouettes that I'm looking for. Measurements seem to be on point too, with the back height being 7.5", front height being about 7", and max width at 6". It coming out looking exactly how I wanted after only 1 super crude foam mockup was 80% luck, just glad it was in my favor on this step.

 

[davidnagel]

Amazing. Thank you for sharing your works in progress! I'd LOVE to do a Kermit one day so seeing other people go through iterations is really reassuring of my potential chaotic journey, when and if I get there that is...

 

[KOMakesThings]

I love the shape you got! Next time I make a Kermit I'm definitely gonna give your pattern a try.

 

[CookieMonstr372]

nice I think Version 3 looks the best since it has the kermity egg shaped body

 

[bk85]

Since my last post, I signed up for a free trial of Stan Winston and watched 3 courses about puppet building which helped give me some tips. I'd definitely recommend it! I watched tons of YouTube/instagram videos and these classes had A LOT of extra tips and tricks that were new to me.

Now that I had my body done, I needed to put in some boning around either end to help keep the shape. I got some fabric wrapped plastic boning. The boning was 1/4" and the fabric brought it to 1/2" wide. I then cut a length about an inch and a half longer than I needed and sewed up the cut ends, curled it into an appropriately sized circle, overlapping by that extra inch and a half, and sewed it together to lock in the shape. I just estimated by eye, making sure it was just ever so slightly less than the outer diameter of the top and bottom holes in the body. Remember that these holes are 2 different sizes so don't make the same sized rings for both. I then glued them into place using contact cement. Admittedly, I went a bit too heavy with the contact cement. I tried to keep the segment of the rings where the overlap was at the back of the puppet.

Now that I had a nice firm structure, it came time to wrap the cheap fleece around the body to figure out my fleece template. I did this the way that was shown by ECL here, and Puppet Nerd & Swazzle on YouTube. When I laid the fabric flat to see where my seams/cut lines/darts would be it was SOOOO asymmetrical. I don't even know how some of the darts/seams ended up where they did, lol. I scanned it, pulled it into Illustrator to make create a digital pattern and tried some cleanup and making it symmetrical. I could have done this manually but since I want to share my patterns once done, I'm really trying to make them all nice and neat in Illustrator. Here's what I made but I wasn't happy with it. End result is red outline in 3rd pic.

I decided to switch gears and use my foam body pattern as a basis but do some math to limit the number of seams. Much like KOMakesThings, I too liked the idea of using the body pattern but like I previously said there were a lot of recommendations against it. To hell with convention I say!

I took my foam pattern and calculated the amount to space in the darts so that I could remove the same amount, but decrease the number of darts. I basically wanted a total of 4 darts- 1 top and 1 bottom on each side of the body, and the one seam in the back. Having done the previous steps with the fleece rough template gave me a good idea of how some of the dimensions/shapes needed to end up, so it wasn't all for nothing. I basically just tried to keep the area the same but reconfigure how it's laid out. Red lines are the foam pattern, green lines are my estimates for the fleece pattern. The reason it is taller by an inch on each the top and bottom is so that there is some overage to wrap into the inside of the body and secure. Rather than making the darts huge, I stole a bit of negative area from them and added it to the back seam, which is why the curve is more drastic than in the foam. You can see in the 2nd picture, it's not too dissimilar from the one done traced/symmetrized from the earlier one...just a bit cleaner and more even, with the darts in a better location.

Since this was a quick mock up, I decided to just sew it on my recently acquired vintage sewing machine. I folded the fabric on the straight line, traced it out, sewed along the back line, folded again for the darts, sewed the lines for the darts, and cut it out, leaving as small a seam line as possible. Adam Kreutenger (Puppet Nerd) has a good video about this method. It was hard to take pics while sewing, so I just have the pattern layout pre-tracing, and the result.

Time to do a test fitting and see if my math paid off...

SUCCESS! Nailed it! So, just goes to show you- don't be hesitant to break from convention. I know I didn't strictly use my body pattern as-is but I definitely did 100% of the math and rearranging in a 2d environment only using measurements from my foam body pattern only. I wouldn't have done this if I only went by the advice received from experienced builders. I'm definitely not saying that either way is better- just do what works for you.

I probably won't be able to progress much until next weekend. This weekend, I will be going to the Henson Company's puppet improv show "Puppet Up!" and I sprang for the add-on VIP tour of the Henson Lot. I know they probably won't have any (now) Disney Muppet stuff on display, but hopefully I can glean some information from what I do see. I'll be sure to take and share pics, if allowed!

 

[KOMakesThings]

I probably won't be able to progress much until next weekend. This weekend, I will be going to the Henson Company's puppet improv show "Puppet Up!" and I sprang for the add-on VIP tour of the Henson Lot. I know they probably won't have any (now) Disney Muppet stuff on display, but hopefully I can glean some information from what I do see. I'll be sure to take and share pics, if allowed!

Oh that's so cool, a tour of the lot sounds like an absolute dream (Especially now that they're selling it!). Enjoy, and excellent job so far on the build. It's been really interesting seeing how you approach this build differently than ECL, really goes to show that there's more than one way to skin a frog.

 

[bk85]

Well... I just couldn't keep myself away. I decided to do the fleece today. I did change up the pattern a bit. After going back to the cheap fleece mock up, I realized that I needed to make the point of the seams (part closest to the mid line of the body) a bit less prominent. They kind of came to a point sticking outwards. I took another look at my pattern and changed the direction of the curves that made up the darts. in my V1 pattern, I went with the more concave shape since that's how they were in my original fleece pattern that was made by draping/cutting while on the body. I changed tactics and made them convex curves so that they would more naturally curve in the proper direction when made 3D. I also slightly adjusted the symmetry and made the darts a bit shorter while in there.

I just went with it and hoped for the best. I didn't have the patience to make a second mock up. Thankfully it worked out great. The seams are barely visible and everything lined up where it should!

While sewing it up, I realized that I never showed off the small patch of an actual Kermit that I purchased. I purchased this having no idea that the back would be a treasure trove of information. You can see the whip stitch that was used, how fine it is, and some red markings that I assume were part of a pattern transfer or notations for lining things up. It's the small 1" square sitting atop my in-progress Fuzzelle body. The color accuracy is not 100% on camera but the Fuzzelle is very close to the real fleece. The color is very close but a bit duller and less vibrant than the real thing. The real fleece is 100% identical to the 1978 Fisher Price Kermit puppet that I had heard was the same fleece and color as the real Kermit. So, if you're looking to find a good somewhat readily available way to color match your puppet and the real thing, the 1978 FP puppet is definitely the way to go.

I recently purchased a new thread that is a much closer match to the Fuzzelle than the generic thread that I was using. I purchased the Gutermann Mara 100 Poly Core thread in color #336 from Wawak. I can't recommend this thread enough! ECL used a similar one from the same manufacturer but I believe his was the consumer version and this is the "professional" version, so even though the colors are the same, their color identifier numbers are different. Aside from being a great color match, this thread is SUPER tough, doesn't twist, bind, or randomly knot mid stitch when you don't want it to. I also purchased a disappearing ink marker which REALLY helped hide the seams better. When I was previously using a green sharpie, I could totally see it bleed through making the seam just a bit more visible.

Once I sewed up the body, it was time to put it on the foam. This was fairly easy, with the only tricky bit making sure that the seams were straight up and down and that they lined up where you want. The fleece kind of grabs on to the reticulated foam so try to be as accurate when sliding it on as possible. This will save you a lot of frustration trying to twist it around to line up right. I then applied some contact cement to the boning rings, and the part of the fleece that would come into contact with the rings when folded over and tucked inside the body. I used pins to hold the fleece since it has a tendency to curl. I didn't need to make any darts on the folded part. Thankfully it sat inside the body really well. I still need to do a bit of seam cleanup on the lower back and right side of the body tomorrow. I spent the time doing it to the left side of the body tonight and I can definitely tell the difference.

Front:

Left:

Right:

Back:

Depending on what tomorrow shapes up to be- I might try to line the inside of the body with some black flannel because it's what I have on hand and don't have enough Fuzzelle to do it.

 

[SFPROPS]

I prefer F3 fleece for just about everything, but think that the Fuzzelle is the best match for Kermits at this point, and the color is close enough to the original. It's more like the earlier nylon fleeces that had no sheen that most of the original Sesame Street muppets were made from.

I'll be doing mine in F3, custom dyed (I got a very close formula to the 70's Malden Mills (Fisher Price) Kermit green, shaved down a little because I already have a bunch of it. Thank you very much for sharing your journey and offering to share pattern info!

 

[bk85]

I prefer F3 fleece for just about everything, but think that the Fuzzelle is the best match for Kermits at this point, and the color is close enough to the original. It's more like the earlier nylon fleeces that had no sheen that most of the original Sesame Street muppets were made from.

I'll be doing mine in F3, custom dyed (I got a very close formula to the 70's Malden Mills (Fisher Price) Kermit green, shaved down a little because I already have a bunch of it. Thank you very much for sharing your journey and offering to share pattern info!

Thanks!!

Yeah, I originally ordered the Fuzzelle but then discovered the F3 recently and instantly fell in love with it. I had already started this build but I ordered some F3 to have on hand for my next build. I saw 2 dye formulas on Facebook that I want to try out. One of them was compared to the Fisher Price MM fleece (if I’m remembering correctly) and it looked super accurate in pics.

Any tips on shaving fleece? I think the longer pile height is really the main thing that separates F3 from what I see in the Malden Mills and other shiny fleeces they’re currently using.

This puppet I’m building has kind of just become a very expensive prototype to learn techniques before I move on to the F3… which ironically is actually a cheaper fleece

 

[SFPROPS]

" I saw 2 dye formulas on Facebook that I want to try out. One of them was compared to the Fisher Price MM fleece (if I’m remembering correctly) and it looked super accurate in pics. "

I'm pretty sure that one was mine either from Puppet Nerd or one of the Muppet making groups (I can't remember), if it was in the last 6 months or so. I did multiple swatches and dye formulas with the Fisher Price Kermit pattern as the control - knowing it was at least accurate to a certain era. I got distracted from my build after struggling with the head and making Muppet Movie Banjo replica kits.

"Any tips on shaving fleece?"

I have one of those sweater shavers designed to remove pills. It's pretty effective. Mine has a guard that lets you adjust depth of cut.

Amazon.com

"I think the longer pile height is really the main thing that separates F3 from what I see in the Malden Mills and other shiny fleeces they’re currently using."

Right now, the other two options being sold are Fuzzelle and Nylafleece, and both are fairly matte in color. Fuzzle is very similar in texture to Malden Mills but not quite as sparkly and a little shorter pile (IMO). I like the F3 as you can have it be more "fuzzy" for that late Muppet Show look which slightly resembles sparkly carved foam (why Jim liked it), or shave it down a little and get a closer nap like the early characters.

 

[bk85]

As previsouly mentioned, I got the opportunity to go to the Jim Henson Company Lot this weekend for a tour and to see "Puppet Up!". If you ever have the opportunity to buy tickets for the show, do not hesitate! I had such an awesome time watching 2 hours of very adult humor puppet improv. I genuinely haven't laughed that hard in a while.

For the tour, we were taken around the lot, into different rooms like their reception area, the board room, Brian Henson's office, and other cool spaces. They had some original creatures that I tried to take some pics of in case they help anybody with references. As expected, no Muppet puppets around, but since the lot was decorated before the sale of the Muppets to Disney, there are still images of them all over the place.

The tour ended up with a Q&A session with Brian Henson, and he was so amazingly gracious. He also participated in the actual comedy show by telling a bit of history, getting the crowd hyped up, and then he rejoined later for an improv skit. Overall it was such an amazing experience.

My next couple of posts are basically going to be photo dumps of pics that I'm comfortable posting where other people aren't in the shot. it was pretty crowded in some spaces so I wasn't able to get the best angles but hopefully these can help anybody that is looking for references of The Dark Crystal, Where the Wild Things Are, Turkey Hollow, The Adventures of Pinocchio, The Flintstones, and some suit of armor that I don't know the origins of.

Parts of the lot itself, showing the main gate, Kermit (originally from California Adventure's Muppet Vision 3D), Kermit and Piggy Bathroom Signs, and a panoramic of both Chaplin's old workshop/previous Henson Creature Shop and the Schoolhouse for child actors in Chaplin's day. I wish I could share other images of this beautifully quirky lot but there were too many people wandering around and I'm personally not comfortable sharing those pictures publicly.

 

[bk85]

Aughra from The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance. They keep her in their executive conference room

 

[bk85]

An original Skeksis from the original Dark Crystal movie (SkekEkt)

 

[bk85]

Other characters from various productions

 

[bk85]

Now, back to the frog of the hour!

Earlier this week, I put in a lining inside f the body. As mentioned before, I used some black flannel that I had on hand. I basically made a trapezoid where the top and bottom widths matched the circumference of the top and bottom holes (plus seam allowance). I folded the fabric, lined the edge of my pattern with the folded edge of the fabric and cut it out. I then took it to my sewing machine to give the top and bottoms a 1/2 inch hem and then sewed up the two sides giving myself a tube shape. I used white thread as I didn't have any black on hand, but I have since purchased some.

I then attached it to the body. I kept the seams towards the foam, with the nice side of the tube facing inward so that all of the scraggly bits are not touching your arm. I used green thread and whip stitched the two openings to their respective hole in the body. I also made sure to sew through the sleeve, the fleece, and the fabric wrapped boning at the same time. I didn't hit the boning fabric with every stitch, but enough to make sure that everything is thoroughly secured into place so that I wasn't only relying on the glue to hold the fleece on the body. It was at this point that I REALLY wished I had a thimble as pushing a needle through 2 layers of fleece, 2 layers of flannel, 4 layers of the fabric that covered the boning, and 2 layers of glue started to absolutely destroy my finger. I eventually (more than halfway through) remembered that I had a piece of thin tooling leather from a previous project and used that as a makeshift barrier between my finger and the needle. It worked really well, thankfully, and allowed me to finish up the sewing.

Now, time to temporarily secure the head just to make sure I wouldn't have any black lining visible once the head was attached. Just before I did this, I trimmed down the neck a bit since that wasn't a consideration until this point. When originally sewing up the head, I made a knot every 5 stitches or so, so I didn't have to worry about the seams unravelling.

I slipped my hand in, and very suddenly (and painfully) realized that some of the pins securing the head were poking through the body. My poor beaten up hand that I just put through hell because of the whole thimble thing, now had about 5 pins sticking in it. I had accidentally created an Iron Kermit torture device . After swearing at myself and Kermit for a minute, I readjusted the pins and tried again. The lining felt wonderful! I think I'll definitely stick to flannel for the build after this prototype, I just think I'll try to find a green that somewhat matches.

 

[bk85]

Although originally I wasn't going to- I decided to make another head with the liner inside of it. A Muppeteer told me that Kermit has a non-stretch lining inside of his head, and that it used to be cotton but that it feels more like a synthetic now. Like I said, I wasn't going to do that for this prototype but I realized that I have enough fabric to do 1 more head, so I might as well.

To make the liner, I used the same head pattern and cut it out of the same black flannel as above. Even though it doesn't really stretch, I made sure what little stretch there is goes in the same direction that the fleece will. I then sewed it together on my machine, leaving about 1/4" seam allowance. More on this later. I then cut out a new head from the Fuzzelle and whip stitched that by hand, as before.

While I had the opportunity, I did modify the mouth plate ever so slightly. I rounded out the tip of the top part a bit more as it was a smidge too pointy. I also scaled it up about 5% larger. I cut a new one out of the 1/16" gasket material. One thing that I noticed in my previous build was that the gaff tape didn't stick to the rubber well at all. I learned a trick in that Stan Winston course of putting some of the contact cement on the rubber, letting it dry, and sticking the tape to that. It worked awesome! I only did the hinge on the back and used self adhesive velvet to line the inside of the mouth. I added a tiny dot which would be covered up by the uvula thing to keep track of which side is the top, as it's a bit longer, and where the center is to help place the uvula and tongue.

I also took the time to create the uvula and tongue for inside the mouth. I used some reference pics of Kermit with his mouth wide open to get me the appropriate shapes and scale and drew them up in Illustrator. Since these pieces are a bit fiddly with all of the curves, I used my Cricut to cut them out. The uvula area is black self adhesive velvet and the tongue is a pink felt that I got from Puppet Pelts. I don't think it's the right color though as Kermit's tongue is a bit more vibrant. I'm currently comparing a few felts and waiting on samples for the collar so I'll pick up some better tongue felt at the same time. I took a sharpie to the tongue to add in a bit of dimension. Admittedly, this could have definitely been done better. To adhere the felt tongue to the mouth, I cut out another tongue shape from heavy card stock and used that to make a template for applying the glue.

To get the lining to attach to the inside, I glued it to the mouth as I would have with the fleece BUT I glued it to the wrong side of the mouth (the part your hand touches inside the puppet) so that it wouldn't add bulk to the lip line.

Now I attached the green fleece to the inside of the mouth plate, after drawing a line to help track where the glue needed to go.

Once I slipped my hand in, I knew instantly that this was the way to go! The head was previously just a touch too large for my hand and you could definitely see the bumps from my fingers in it before. Now it fit perfectly, it really smoothed out the shape of the head, and just felt so much better against my skin than the fleece. I wish that I decided to do this before I put in the body lining because it would be better with 1 solid piece going from the mouth all the way to the bottom opening. I'll do that next time. I whip stitched the bottom flannel to the bottom fleece so that they became one piece. Time to finally get the head on the body!

I securely pinned the head where it should go and then used a curved needle and a ladder stitch to connect it to the body.

I put the puppet on my hand and my heart sank. Like a complete doofus, I didn't think about the fact that flannel is a fabric that very easily frays. The top seam of the head lining had ripped. Of course this happened after I secured the head to the body, with no easy way of accessing the problem area. After brutally contorting Kermit's body in ways that would be considered war crimes, I was able to get to the rip and glue on another piece of fabric to connect the separated pieces and secure the overall seam. Although I love the flannel, I might need to reconsider the fabric or take some time to learn proper seam stitches that won't fray, and maybe invest in some pinking shears to see if they help. My sewing machine only does straight and zig-zag stitches, but I think/hope I can make do with that.

Here's Kermit at the present, stuffed with a bit of foam and fiber fill to help keep his shape.

I think I'll tackle the eyes and/or the collar next.

 

[davidnagel]

Amazing

 

[KOMakesThings]

Lots of good ideas in this thread to try for my next Kermit build... never thought of lining Kermit's head before! In hindsight I feel like it makes a lot of sense to have some lining in there, if nothing else to protect the fleece from sweat from the puppeteer's hand. But I also really like the idea of it acting like a bit of interfacing to help pad out Kermit's face.