On behalf of TVlesson.com my name is Paul Louis. I’m a professional puppeteer and puppet
builder. Let’s talk a little bit about creating a personality for your character. Personality is
everything when it comes to puppets. This puppet here who is staring at me while I’m trying to
talk is Basco the Mouse. Basco the Mouse was designed to look kind of like a little tough guy
character sp we gave him a leather jacket. We gave him some jeans and some sneakers and with
that in mind when the puppeteer put him on his arm, he kind of created his own personality and
his own voice. So Basco was kind of hey how you doing? I’m Basco the Mouse, yeah that’s
right. And I am a mouse from Brooklyn. So Basco is kind of created his own style. I would
imagine based on his appearance. When you put a character on your hand and you look at him in
all likely hoods the character is going to create himself.
For instance this character over here is Dozer the dodo bird. Now he was very elegant looking,
very colorful. His eyes kind of drooped and he gave me the appearance that he was just kind of a
snobbish well to do type of character. So right away when I looked at him my voice kind of went
up like that and I had kind of an English accent and smock a little through my nose and Dozer
the dodo bird was born, yes I am Dozer the dodo bird, very elegant if I do say so myself. Yes you
were Dozer, Dozer, whatever. That was a non going joke on the show that he was in.
but anyway puppets can create their own personality simply by the way they look and again you
will be in control of how that character will sound, how that character will act. It just takes again
a little time, little patience, little ingenuity and lots of creativity. So check out a puppet and make
him come to life. On behalf of TVlesson.com this has been Paul Louis, thank you for watching.