Meeting, Chunky Tusks & Elephant Legs!

This morning's meeting went great - everyone was feeling awake, positive and ready to go. I went around the group, asking each person what their plan was for out 3 remaining studio days was, and how they intended to go about doing it. The list (for those who turned up to the meeting) was as follows:
Amy - hyenas; attaching ears, covering them in gum tape, painting them, adding handles to the inside of the heads, adding eyes and attaching the fabric manes both to the heads and to the baseball capes, complete with fabric scrap manes.
Connor - finishing all three of the bird kites by mounting them on the carbon rods that have just arrived, then helping Melissa with the Mufasa head.
Melissa - finishing the Mufasa head by upholstering all of it with muslin, adding a wadding or cotton wool mane and painting it with both brushes and an airbrush.
Becca and Ollie - the finishing of Pumba via finishing touches such as more goat hair along his back, and a protective coat of PVA.
Naomi - perfecting the pattern for the antelopes along with cutting the remaining pattern pieces out, sewing them up and stuffing them, with a minimum of one antelope being completed including paint and arm straps in time for Tuesday's deadline.
Andrea - working between creatures to help with any small parts that need doing, including helping with the elephant's legs, attaching Zazu to his respective baseball cap and sewing up the antelopes.
Lorraine - continuing work on the antelopes, also attaching fabric to the various animals that need draping e.g. cheetahs.
Esme - helped to finish up at least one zebra mask, along with any help needed on the elephant and Giraffes, including painting.
Myself - Attaching various masks to hats, working on the elephant and guiding and helping out with any small jobs that others ask for guidance on.

The group worked well throughout the day, making good progress with only a few members leaving early. A lot of people had other project commitments to see to. Before taking lunch after the meeting I unpacked the elephant's leg tubing, cutting it into four quarters and experimenting with the movement and height of it needed to work effectively as legs.
After lunch I took to working on the elephant, upholstering it with the newly arrived sparse jute and some tighter-weave jute that I had as leftovers from another project.

I decided to use cable ties to secure the fabric onto the willow structure as it was so sparse and it created a secure attachment the same way that the structure itself had been created.

I created more solid panels with the denser jute in the parts of the face that didn't need to be looked through. This also provided a good base for painting and a great way to attach the tusks - by pulling the fabric around them, securing it with cable ties then folding the fabric around it and hot gluing it.

The unpainted face with the fabric sleeve ear, testing the placement of the eyes. I am looking forwards to painting the piece in a way that accentuates the contours of the willow and gives it a big impact on the stage. Tomorrow I intend to paint the fabric and attach the eyes, so I can focus on making it comfortable and secure to wear. The girls will have their heads in the see-through portion of the top of the elephant's head, with the backpacks or other straps on their fronts to secure it whilst they give piggybacks to the younger girls waving the ears.
Here are pictures of two of Connor's colourful bird kites, before and after being attached to the carbon rods. Attaching them was done simply and effectively using cable ties above and below the bird to prevent it from flying off whilst still allowing it to move and spin freely.

The method of attaching the masks has been perfected at this point and is now a quick and easy process. Mufasa, Simba, Nala, a cheetah and all of the zebras are now attached to hats. It is done by using the industrial hole puncher to neatly punch three to four holes in each front side of the mask, or in the cheetah's case 4 at the front - it depends on the shape of the base. The hat is then inserted, placement marked in pencil and then it is sewn on using the thick linen thread and a large needle.

Claire wearing a cheetah head. Eyes have been added, made of
scrap acrylic sheet with one side sanded and painted black. 
Upholstery foam is used to make the mask sit 
more upright on the wearer's head.