Nightcrawlers

 This video is another one concerning the so-called unexplained, believe it or not. Quite a few of my viewers comment and suggest that I tackle more cryptozoological subjects, i e strange creatures people claim to have seen.

In the world of paranormal research and cryptozoology, the case of the Fresno Nightcrawlers stands out because of how bizarre it is. Back in 2007, what looks like a pair of white pants walking about on their own was caught on a nighttime security video recording in Fresno, California. A while later two pants, now dubbed "Nightcrawlers" were filmed at night in Yosemite National Park and another bit of footage came out of Poland. The latest sighting is another home surveillance video from Billings, Montana, in 2020. So, are these sightings just crazy hoaxes? Probably. However, nobody has come forward, admitting to the pranks, and nobody has been able to exactly reproduce the Nightcrawlers. 

As you can see the Fresno Nightcrawlers have inspired people to get creative (I'm not the only one.) Besides various t-shirt prints, there are also a number of crafts pieces sold on Etsy and other places. Fun stuff!

As you might expect a stop-motion Nightcrawler is a very simple puppet. The feet are two threaded 3 mm nuts attached to a folded 2 mm aluminum wire with a mix of super glue and baking soda. The head is a small paper ball. I find that having a bit of unjointed aluminum wire makes it wobbly and difficult to animate. To fix that problem I added three toothpick pits along each length of wire and wrapped soft yarn over it all.

The padding of the body was equally simple. A wrapping of soft polyurethane foam to make out the general shape, and then more smooth foam shapes added over that.

I covered the foam with patches of latex patches cast on the smooth backside of an old plaster mold. As you can see the colors of each patch differed a bit since I used leftovers from small batches of tinted latex from other projects.

The finished puppet was dabbed with latex tinted white, applied with a sponge.

We have one human character in the story, a boy played by Hannes whom I've used a few times before. Our young hero spies the Nightcrawlers striding through his back garden, being zapped by a UFO, and nobody will believe him, of course.

Speaking of the UFO, it's really this CG blob, downloaded as a stock video clip from one of my various stock media subscriptions. I created a mask around it in After Effects to get rid of the black background. All backgrounds of the neighborhood locations are also stock images found at DepositPhotos.com.

To have the Nightcrawlers walk behind plants and objects in these backgrounds I created two layers for each background that would be used in such scenes.

The easiest way (for me) to do this is to open the image in Photoshop and use the masking tool to draw over every bit that I want to go in front of my animated puppets.

The masked area can then be copied and saved as an image of its own. In After Effects, I then sandwich the puppets in between these layers.

So that's my Nightcrawler video, short and sweet. There will be more films based on unexplained phenomena, probably the more fun and bizarre subjects.

The Jersey Devil: The Finished Film

It took a while, but I've finished my Jersey Devil film project. There's actually not that much to say about it production-wise, because I've already said it! You can find all that info on an earlier post right HERE.

I Thought I Saw That Jersey Devil part 1: The Puppet and Song

The USA is shockful of weird and wonderful legends, and one of the oldest and still most vital among them is the tale(s) of the Jersey Devil. This peculiar gargoyle-ish critter hails from the Pine Barrens forest of southern New Jersey. As legend tells it it's the thirteenth child of Mother Leeds; a local witch who cursed the unfortunate infant for the pains he was giving her. The child transformed into a demon, killed the midwife and escaped up the chimney. Since this harrowing episode, said to have occurred in 1735, the "devil" has been seen numerous times, and is still reported every now and then. It's a seemingly deathless creature. The scream it utters is apparently unlike anything else ever heard. I had relatives who lived in the Pine Barrens in the 1970's and 80's, but sadly, they never had any unusual experiences in the area.

I've done a fair amount of research and articles for Swedish press on the subject of Cryptozoology, and I've returned to the Jersey Devil time and time again. I built a small model of the monster way back in the 1990's, but this now crumbling latex and plastic creation was not made for animation. I thought it was actually high time to produce a proper puppet AND animate it.


Actually, the other big reason for me to make the film is this cool and clever song by Kevin Welch. I saw this performance on YouTube, and thought the tune was both atmospheric and humorous. So I contacted Kevin about being able to use it as the soundtrack for my film, and he said yes without any hesitation. Now I like him even more! So, while waiting for my finished video, please enjoy a live rendition of the song by Kevin Welch.

The challenge I put to myself was to make a large puppet, having the strength to stand on one rather spindly leg in a mid-air leap or stride. So I turned to my Monster Clay, so I could chisel out tiny details in the skin of the creature. The head and chest were created separately, and were the only parts sculpted in clay.

This armature was actually built in a slightly different way than I usually do. I simply laid several aluminum wires next to each other in a clump, tied together with sewing string. I added thin nails with the heads clipped off to the aluminum wire clumps, and thereby achieved the unbending "bone" parts I at least have to have when animating, or the puppet will bend all over its body. As you can see, the chest area has a rudimentary rib cage, and the back has a hunch where the wings will be attached. Those parts are aluminum wires covered with Friendly Plastic thermoplastic.

I've talked so many times about how I make bat wings that I'll skip that here, but here's how the wings looked straight out of their plaster cradles.

The puppet came together very quickly. The head has jointed upper and lower lips, and ears using aluminum wires. I'm having my favourite scrapbooking crimson beads for the eyes. I'm using Friendly Plastic to bond all the parts together. Varying densities of polyurethane foam make up the muscles. The little hoofs are also Friendly Plastic.

The puppet is skinned with patches of latex skins cast in plaster moulds of various sculpted skin textures. The knobbly spine was created by just adding drops of tinted latex with a pointy wooden tool. The claws and teeth are cotton and latex.

The finished puppet has a base colour of black/blue/red PAX paint, and Liquitex acrylic airbrush paint. It's over a foot tall, and very light. You'll see just how flexible it is in the eventual animation. I have to say that it's one of the best and effective animation puppets I've built so far.

Time to step out into the woods and find the proper places where you might expect to meet a devil. I won't be visiting the real Pine Barrens, but I have a swampy pine wood area just a stone's throw from where I live. And who'll be in the film is yet to be seen. I'll be calling on some of my friends that don't mind being chased by imaginary monsters through the woods.