"Bat-Tholomew" - Wearable Animatronic Bat
Project Brief
"You are the character, and part of your outfit is animated. It can be any type of costume piece or accessory, such as a hat, watch, broach, belt, shoe, glasses, etc. It can appear to be made of any material or combination of materials. The animated item can be magical, sci-fi, a sentient creature disguised as a prop or costume, or just a part of your costume that moves independently (like in a cartoon)."
For this project and a joining skit, I crafted the idea of a girl scout-type troop leader who was having the absolute worst day ever, lost the kids she was looking after in the woods, and of course, unknowingly has a bat stuck in her hair.
The build is a wig with a bat animatronic attached to it. The wings are moved via two servos housed within the body of the bat. The wings were molded in plaster then casted in Flex Foam for the spiny fingers and liquid latex for the membrane of the wings. the body was modeled in Fusion 360 and 3D printed in PLA. The servos are housed in the body, and the Arduino and battery pack powering the servos are in a "mic pack" worn on the wearer's back. All wires are hidden by the length of the wig. A button to control the wing flapping is hidden behind the right ear and is able to be pressed or pressed and held to lengthen the cycle of movement. One cycle is four movements The head was sculpted in Nomad and 3D printed in resin. Since this is a wearable animatronic and I know from my experience in costume design, wearing anything = wearing out everything, so every piece of the bat is easily replaceable. The head can be removed from the body and reprinted if damaged. The body can also be detached from the wig and reprinted. Both parts of the wings are re-castable (if you keep the molds, of course!) and easy to reattach to the servos.
Build Process
Part one of a two part plaster mold with clay master for the spiny-bone part of the wings. This part of the wings was later cast in FlexFoam-iT! with a metal understructure encased inside. This allowed for greater flexibility and posablity for the wing once it was attached to the servos.
Latex rubber drying in the plaster wing membrane mold.
Raw latex pull of the wing membrane. Color was achieved via food dye mixed into the latex. This membrane was then glued to the spiny-bone part of the wings and then trimmed to shape.
3D sculpted bat head in Nomad (left). Finished 3D resin printed bat head, painted with acrylic mixed with flocking powder and UV resin to give the eyes a spooky glossy shine (right).
Finished bat animatronic attached to wig.