Jen's Pug

I think this is the first real toy I designed and sculpted! I wanted to give my GF at the time a birthday present and she owned this little pug named Mushu, who had a slight nerve problem that caused his tongue to hang out constantly. It was pretty cute. So I made a toy of him for her!

I thought it would be fun to make a little pug that when you wiggled his tail, the tongue would move across his mouth.  I thought it would be pretty easy to hide a simple lever mechanism inside his body.

I started by sculpting the whole piece as I normally would. The tail I did as a separate piece because it had to move.  I also dug a slot where the mechanism for the moving tail.

  

Then I cut him in half and baked in the oven! Boo-hoo-ha-haha!

After the pieces were baked and cooled, I took my Dremel tool and carefully hollowed out the inside of the both body pieces. I drilled a small hole in the front of the mouth as a guide so I didn't drill out the mouth too far.

I took an eye hook and screwed it into the top of the back piece. I put some epoxy putty around it to make sure it wouldn't come out after I put the halves back together!  The wire that will eventually connect the tail and the tongue was run down the back slot through the eye hook and finally out through the mouth.

I pre-painted the mouth black since I didn't want to paint it with the tongue in place.

The tongue I made with 2 felt pieces sandwiched over a thin metal loop.  This way, with the wire inside, the tongue could be posable.

The tongue wire was attached with more epoxy putty.

I put a "diaper" around the felt so it would stay clean... cuz I'm a slob.

With the mechanism in place, I joined the two halves together using epoxy putty and sanded it smooth when dry.

All primed for paint!

And finished! Turned out pretty cool. Check out the video so you can see him slurp!

I put little felt paw pads on the bottom and signed it for Jen. She really dug her pug!

Jen with her Mushu II !

Mushu with Mushu II !

MUSHU PUG TOY VIDEO






UP NEXT...

...Why so serious...?