MovieChat Forums > Bear in the Big Blue House (1997) Discussion > how do they

how do they

posted 18 years ago by m_simpsons5
12 replies | jump to latest

stupid question. But how do they get the bears mouth and eye brows to move. Is it a guy in a suit or is it mechanical. Or is it a guy in a suit who has strings or whatever to move his mouth and such.

[–] jldimbatt 18 years ago

I've been wondering the same thing...my husband and I have a bet on whether he is mechanical or there is someone inside...can't find the answer anywhere on the net!

[–] m_simpsons5 18 years ago

Yeah maybe its both.

[–] spam_ninja 18 years ago

There is an actor in a suit with an animatronic head.

There are probably one if not several people out of view with what look like RC helicopter controls (the handheld device that operates the mechanism).

[–] m_simpsons5 18 years ago

makes sense. I would say thats the most logical answer.

[–] spam_ninja 18 years ago

Thanks.

You know... I wondered if I should expound upon that, but decided to heck with it.

Normally, one controller might have "eyebrows", another, the "mouth" and sometimes depending on complexity, "nose", "eyes", "ears", "lips", basically anything that can display emotion.

[–] jameschall15 17 years ago

ya but if you watch his right arm it doesnt move unless the left arm does they are connected by a string freeing the right arm to operate the mouth with the ring and middle finger and thumb for the mouth and the pointer and pinky for eyebrow I just cant figure out where the actor sees from I think there is a space near the base of the neck

[–] BadaBingBong 18 years ago

There is an actor inside Bear. He uses his right hand to operate the mouth and face features. Notice that Bear's LEFT hand is the only articulated one. The other hand/arm just kinda hangs there.

If you look closely you will see a clear fishing line string attached to the right hand that goes into the below neck area. It is tethered through the upper torso to the left hand. When the left hand moves out the right hand/arm moves in.

Most puppeteers are right handed, and they control face/mouth movements with their right hand. This makes the muppet character LEFT handed.

[–] gg82 18 years ago

Thanks for clearing that up! I was wondering about Bear, too. He's amazing! For a muppet/animatronic bear he can do everything! I had assumed he was part human/part robot because I remember when I was a kid the giants on Fraggle Rock were like huge walking computers with actors inside each giant.

[–] joesgirljeri 18 years ago

Where does the actor inside the puppet see out of? This is what I can't figure out! Whoever is inside the suit is GOOD, Bear always looks like he's using his eyes to look at whatever he's doing, even though the actor's head is probably in the neck somewhere, and his hand controlling the head is probably held above his head. Can you imagine how tiring it would be to run this puppet all day?

Also, sometimes Bear does use his right hand, in tight shots but it looks a little unnatural (like when he's playing checkers). I think probably a different person is controlling the right hand, and the main puppeteer still has control of the left hand and the head.

[–] hergrace-1 18 years ago

Bear works a lot like Big Bird. The guy inside (Noel M.) has a monitor (small TV screen) that hangs around his neck and balances on his chest. He looks *down* to see what he's doing. He doesn't see Bear's POV; he sees Bear! I don't know how he does it, except that these puppeteers are all trained to watch their performances on monitors rather than watching their puppets. I love watching them at work!

[–] spam_ninja 17 years ago

I specifically paid attention to this after reading this post and noticed that the right hand is actually wired to the left one.

The wire runs through the base of the throat of Bear.

Now, this really makes me wonder how Snook is done. http://pbskids.org/bigbigworld/snook.html

[–] 17 years ago

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