Joe Rampolla is at it again. I linked to his toy train website a few months ago; today he sent me a link to a new animation project that he calls “My Secondhand Lions.”
I would have liked the project even if he hadn’t made reference to one of my favorite movies.Basically, his project uses a low-RPM motor, some papier mache, scrap lumber, and some heavy wire to animate some Fisher-Price toy lions. He says this project costs less than $25 to build.
If it had the initials M, T, and H on it, I’m sure it would cost $200.
I like his use of acrylic paint on cheap toys–many cheap toys have gorgeous details that are obscured by the glare of light off bare plastic–and his use of papier mache to make the plateau.
So… How would I add a sound effect to it? There was a radio commercial here in St. Louis that included a line, “Watch out for that plastic mountain lion!” followed by an extremely sarcastic and unenthusiastic “rooo-a-r” uttered by an obviously human actor. I don’t even remember what the commercial was for, but I love that line. These plastic lions with a pushbutton to play an unenthusiastically recorded human roar would be a nice touch.
It’s yet another something for me to build some day.
David Farquhar is a computer security professional, entrepreneur, and author. He has written professionally about computers since 1991, so he was writing about retro computers when they were still new. He has been working in IT professionally since 1994 and has specialized in vulnerability management since 2013. He holds Security+ and CISSP certifications. Today he blogs five times a week, mostly about retro computers and retro gaming covering the time period from 1975 to 2000.