Fox Puppet Progress (Let's start with the head)

Been wanting to build a fox puppet for a long time so why not start now. Drew up some sketches and started my sculpt in zbrush. I thought about doing a hand sculpt but why not get it perfectly symmetrical and easy to replicate in the future. So going the 3D route made more sense.

Not wanting to make my personal fursona per say but a young girly fox that loves to travel the world and explore. I really want to use this puppet for travel videos and general fact type videos. I love videos with suits but don't see many with puppets and wanted to create something fun and appealing. 

I sculpted the head very much like I do a fursuit head but with the mouth closed. Since I plan to cut the mouth open and I am casting in foam it is easier to cast with the mouth shut. The eyes are just placeholders to give myself an idea how I would want them to look. I want to cast the ears, nose and eyes separately to have an overall cleaner look. 

Being able to print the head in parts will make it easier for me to customize and create and overall cleaner look. The biggest issue I have even with suit heads is getting the ears to be symmetrical, decided to completely eliminate that issue by making ear markers where the ears go. The nose, eyes and teeth will be printed in resin. The ears will be casted in foam. Now to create the 3D printed mold to cast the head in foam.

I put the head into a box in zbrush, remove the ears as those will be casted on their own. Create registration points which you can see where the spheres are and the box is ready to be printed in 2 parts. The head is going to be about 9 inches wide from cheek to cheek so it will be a larger puppet. I still need to make the insert for the head in the shape of a hand which will also be used as back pressure when casting foam.

One of the halves was started last night and the other on the other printer. If all goes well without failures I should have both halves ready to show mid this week.

Will continue updating puppet progress as I work on this project. If you have any questions be sure to ask.