Robotic puppetry at its finest: the animatronic creations of Gustav Hoegen

I had no idea this kind of thing could be done with animatronics.

From the YouTube Description:

Not CGI, but wow, what an amazing animatronic showreel by the talented Gustav Hoegen! Gustav's specialty is Animatronic Effects, Prosthetic Makeup Effects for TV and Film. His credits and some shots shown in this video include: Prometheus, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Clash of the Titans, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Doctor Who and more.

Here is a link to Gustav Hoegen's special effects credits on IMDb.

Found via Awesome Robo!

[ Thanks Glenn! ]

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Hugo DVD and Blu-ray with bonus feature about automata

It's been an exciting week for me. The release of the Martin Scorsese film Hugo on DVD and Blu-ray confirmed at last that I was indeed included in one of the bonus features. I am one of the experts interviewed for a featurette titled The Mechanical Man at the Heart of Hugo.

The DVD edition includes only one extra feature, a nice behind-the-scenes piece titled 'Shoot the Moon: The Making of Hugo'. The Blu-ray special features include:

• Shoot the Moon: The Making of Hugo
• The Cinemagician, Georges Méliès
• The Mechanical Man at the Heart of Hugo
• Big Effects, Small Scale
• Sacha Baron Cohen: The Role of a Lifetime

The Mechanical Man at the Heart of Hugo covers the history of automata, examines the human drive to replicate life in mechanical form, and explores why we find them so compelling. Among the speakers on the featurette are:

• Martin Scorsese - Director / Producer
• Ben Kingsley - Oscar winning actor
• Graham King - Producer
• Dick George - Automaton maker for the film Hugo
• Thomas Kuntz - Artist / Automaton maker
• Dug North - Automaton maker

The featurette includes footage from the motion picture Hugo, drawings of historical automata, 3D animations, antique automata in motion -- some without their outer coverings so you can see what is going on inside, and automata by artist Thomas Kuntz.

Clips from The Mechanical Man at the Heart of Hugo can be found here:

• The drive to replicate life in mechanical form
• The automaton the inspired the one in Hugo
• Why people are fascinated by automata

Being in the feature, I may be biased, but I believe the final product to be an interesting and informative look at mechanical automata. Clocking in at about 13 minutes, it is all to brief and cannot claim to be a comprehensive treatment of the topic. I am honored to have been a part. I hope you will enjoy it too.

Here are the various version of Hugo that are currently available:

• Hugo - One disc: DVD + Digital Copy
• Hugo - Two-disc combo: Blu-ray / DVD Combo + Digital Copy
• Hugo - Three-disc combo: Blu-ray 3D / Blu-ray / DVD + Digital Copy

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Dug North speaks about the Maillardet automaton for Hugo bonus feature

I was interviewed recently for one of the bonus features for the DVD release of the movie Hugo. A team  associated with Paramount came to my studio to film an hour-long interview. Many of the questions I fielded were about the history of automata. This naturally lead to questions about connections between the automaton in Hugo and any historical automata. As it turns out, the automaton in Hugo is closely tied to a real automaton.

Here is a short clip from the special bonus featurette titled The Mechanical Man at the Heart of Hugo. In this segment, I say a bit about the famous Maillardet drawing automaton at The Franklin Institute. I had the pleasure of seeing the automaton in action during a visit there a few years ago. I think my reverence for the masterpieces comes through in the clip.

I particularly love how my segment transitions to Ben Kingsley's. I do hope that I set him up well.

Here is a web page where you can see the video of Dug North speaking about the Maillardet automaton.

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John Gaughan - The mechanical mastermind behind magic illusions and automata

If you didn't catch it yesterday, Boing Boing posted an online interview with the legendary John Gaughan yesterday. Gaugh is the mechanical mastermind behind many famous magical effects and illusions. He is also an expert on various forms of automata and has a collection of important historical pieces and recreations. The interview spends a good deal of time discussing The Turk -- the infamous chess-playing automaton -- an authentic recreation of which (see below) sits among John Gaughan's massive assortment of magical possessions.

Among his many automata treasures is a mechanical life-size figure of Harry Houdini who will sign his name on a piece of paper (see video below).

Here is the full interview with John Gaughan on Boing Boing.

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Spewing corpse animatronic hooks to fog machine

This two foot tall corpse would make for an impressive Halloween display. When fully set up, it turns its head from side-to-side and spews fog from its open mouth. Pretty scary! The creature looks as if it is pulling itself out of the ground, so I imagine you will want to place in front of a nice big old-looking Halloween gravestone prop. I like this more elaborate demon gravestone a bit better, personally.

The set comes with a 110 volt motor to power the corpse's moving head. It also comes the two scary hands, shirt, and frame. The 3 foot long hose attachment will need to be hooked up to a standard 400w or 700w fog machine -- not included, but not outrageous either. They have their uses.

Here's where to get the spewing corpse animated Halloween prop with fog machine accessibility.

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Recreation of Kempelen's speaking machine (1791)

Wolfgang von Kempelen (1734 –1804) is known mainly as the man who created famous The Turk Automaton Chess Player. Kempelen was a gifted inventor who designed steam-engines, water-pumps, a pontoon bridge, a steam turbine for mills, a typewriter for the blind, and various works of architecture. He also created a number of speaking machines, one of which has been recreated and is demonstrated in the video presented here.

From the YouTube description:

The 'speaking machine' of Wolfgang von Kempelen (1734-1804) was the first fully functional speech synthesis ever. This is a short presentation of the replica built 2007-09 at the department of Phonetics of Saarland University, Saarbrücken (Germany) by Fabian Brackhane, Dominik Bauer with assistance by the Orgelbaumanufaktur Hugo Mayer.

As with many speaking machines and talking dolls, I believe this one is saying "Mama" and "Papa".

You can learn more about Wolfgang von Kempelen in the books The Turk: The Life and Times of the Famous Eighteenth-Century Chess-Playing Machine and also the fascinating Edison's Eve: A Magical History of the Quest for Mechanical Life.

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Amazing animatronics and mechanical costumes

I urge you to pay a visit to the John Nolan Films web site where you can see a gallery of amazing special effects projects including animatronics and mechanical costumes.

Here is the gallery of images showing various animatronics and here is their demo reel showing video of animatronics in action.

[ Thanks Bre! ]

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Mechanism for animatronic mask in latex and foam

F.X. Déco is a French company who creates video, sets, masks, make up, figures, costumes, prototypes, models, and animatronics. Shown here is a the exposed mechanism for mask done in latex and foam and animated with radio-controlled servomotors.

See more fabulous creations by F.X. Dé on their web site.

[ Thanks Karin! ]

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