Our first good glimpse of Vonky’s merkin. I’m rather proud of that.

This shot isn’t what it seems. This is from Kim’s POV but his body isn’t even on set. The fat hands you see are merely stuck to the painting’s frame, which is lifted up via a plastic iPhone mount that is obscured underneath.

“Nice pet. Now pay up.”

Amanda is all business.

Kim is ecstatic to see his latest acquisition, but he has no clue the Mona Lisa was not that fat. Because, North Korea.

I made Kim’s glasses by super-gluing my cockatoo skeleton’s actual eye socket bones onto Kim’s glasses, a la Elton John. Then I painted them with white neon paint so they would glow under UV light along with the paint splatters on his clothes.

Kim’s hat is fashioned out of Dennis Rodman’s basketball shorts, stuffed with actual sulfur-crested cockatoo feathers.

This was a deceptively complex shot. I had to figure out how to spin Amanda and land her briefcase onto Kim’s table in a very limited number of frames, in such a way that the briefcase could be opened with the painting facing Kim.

Well it turns out I only had to make a 90° turn since Amanda is still on roller skates and the painting was facing the right way. There was a 50/50 chance of this, so I lucked out. Otherwise I would need to spin her 270°.

My next challenge was lighting. I didn’t have many mini key lights available (yet), so instead I animated Dennis’ cockatoo wings to spread out enough to drape behind Amanda in such as way as to provide contrast for her silhouette. Otherwise she would have blended in with the dark gray wall behind her. This also helped drive home the idea that Dennis was truly desperate for attention, if not love.

Vonky has introduced Kim to an American delicacy: Pringles. This amazing prop was made by JCMiniatureShop on Etsy. I animated the chips sliding out using tweezers and little dabs of LocTite FUN-TAK. Note the plastic lid held in Kim’s right hand. Sounds effects will be added from an actual Pringles can.

Dennis is transforming into a cockatoo while begging Amanda, “Won’t you be mine?”

This is done using two exposures per pose: One with Rodman’s head, and one with the cockatoo skull. Then the two exposure layers are blended together in post, in varying proportions. Did you ever see the 1980 sci-fi movie Altered States?

This was trickier than it sounds because the puppet body and its wings are inside a cage. So it helped to keep the neck joint as loose as possible. The swaps had to be done without moving Amanda and without Rodman falling on his broken leg. If either of those things happened, the pair of frames had to be reposed and reshot.

Dennis thrusts his makeshift bouquet in Amanda’s face but she just patronizes him and vogues for the camera.

This overhead swivel shot gives us our first look at Vonky and her skimpy sex slave costume. The green screen inside the spherical view screen will get filled in later.

This is a fun overhead swoop shot, achieved by placing the bunker set on the floor so I could have both side walls up and still reach inside from the top. But that also meant our curious cat Bella had easy access to the open cage end, which was full of bird bones and feathers. “You can look but don’t touch!” Occasionally I would find set pieces missing while shooting these scenes.

Technically, I ramped my iFootage Shark slider along the top of the set box, upside-down, so that my eMotimo Spectrum and Canon camera were underslung — barely skimming the top of the cage and the puppets’ heads. I also bought a special 8mm F/3.0 aspherical fisheye lens for this shot to make the bunker feel big. I couldn’t use that lens for many other shots because it’s super wide angle. But I love the effect.

And my wife loves this shot too!