Fundays at 420: Puppet Mechanics

Hey gang! Well, it's our favorite time of the week once more and time for another segment of Fundays at 420! This week we wanted to bring you three sets of amazing inventors (brought to us by TED) and their work in what Pittsburgh Underground likes to call Puppet Mechanics. Let's begin...

This first group of folks, Adrian Kohler and Basil Jones from Handspring Puppet Company, hail from South Africa and explain their methods of puppet mechanics when developing a full scale replica of an equine created from cane, that also is ridden by a live human in the live theatre production of War-Horse.

The Handspring Puppet Company presents

the Mechanics of War-Horse

Next, we have Arthur Ganson, an inventor who creates mechanical sculptures of all types simply for the sake of making the world smile (trust us, after watching the amazing things this man can do with wire and motors, you'll smile too!).

Arthur Ganson presents Machines

Finally, we have Theo Jansen who is widely known for creating mechanical 'entities' made of wood,reed, sails, and other materials. Referred to as Strandbeests, these creatures 'live' autonomously using the power of wind to keep them in motion.

Theo Jansen presents Strandbeests

Big thank you to Toddy's sister Suey for the info on Theo Jansen and our good buddy Scott Pavetti, software engineer and artist extrordinaire, for the heads up on the Handspring Puppet Company, Arthur Ganson, and TED.

Do you have something fun that you want Pittsburgh Underground to feature on a FUNDAYS at 420 segment? Something super-duper interesting or just silly fun? Every Sunday at 4:20 PM, the gang at good ol' PU wants to showcase all things that fall into this catagory.

If you have something that's wicked cool that the world needs to know about, drop us at line at PU@PU-Zine.com and tell us about it! We'll try and feature it on a future episode. Take care and HAVE FUN!!!