What do you use for your mouth?

[dwayne1115]

Hey gang! I'm going to start trying to build some of my own puppets. I have a lot of great ieads on where to start, but the one thing that confuses me is what to use to open and close the mouth. I'm thinking carbord but that it would not keep very long. Any thoughts?

[shtick]

Gasket rubber, thick corrugated plastic, thick foam core, balsa wood. Anything thats light and durable since the mouth gets worn soonest.

[Buck-Beaver]

I'm at a point now where I think a lot about the character before selecting a material. For example, for a very boring or stiff character I might use a stiff material (like corrugated plastic), but for a zany, expressive character I might use something very flexible like a piece of craft foam or (if the puppet is small enough) just a piece of black felt.

[CoOKiE]

i use cereal box cardboard. its thin and hard enough where you can't tell theres fingers operating the mouth. ALSO... i use felt on the inside to stop it from tearing away due to friction or sweat... mine haven't fallen apart yet

[Jinx]

Search "mouthplates" here at the forum and you will find many, many, many, many discussions on the topic. You'll also find that there are many, many, many, many materials that are suitable! The more detailed the description of the puppet you're intending to build, the narrower the field of possibilities.

[wes]

One Gallon Ice Cream buckets, there lite plastic and it makes the puppet face very expressive.

[Melonpool]

I like using a plastic "for sale" sign for the upper mouth plate and a piece of flexible gasket rubber for the lower, connected by a gaff tape hinge. It makes a very expressive lower mouth that doesn't automatically revert to a frown when it's relaxed. Just make sure that the lower jaw fabric isn't too snug -- it will cause the lower lip curl down a bit.

[practicecactus]

I used the plastic cover from my old spiral bound sketchbooks. It's a nice rigid ultra thin plastic that's like Ice Cream lid stuff.. which is also just as good. And you have an excuse to eat icecream.
But yeah, it helps I got years and years worth of old sketch books to cannibalize.
I just contact cemented on some felt over it all so the edge wouldn't feel cut into my palm, and makes it all nice and comfy.
Also allows me to sew into it.

[keithallison]

I currently use 2 different materials for mouth plates. I use foam core on some and fiberglass on others. The fiberglass is thin but very durable.