How to Make a Balloon spider

Good morning ! Today I will teach you how to make a spider. But, for once,
this tutorial is not really for beginners because some parts are a bit
technical. On the other hand, the result is really very realistic. Come on... I'll show you all this!
To make a red spider with black eyes, you must use 7 red twisting balloons,
1 red classic balloon and 1 black twisting balloon.
We're going to start by inflating a red twisting balloon about half
way, tying the knot, and making a series of 14 little bubbles to follow.
We make sure that the count is correct: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14,
and we attach the series of bubbles to their base. What follows may be a little technical...
Look carefully: from the knot we just made, take the first two
bubbles that face each other between the fingers of your hand, in this way. We fold the
large bubble of the remaining balloon segment that we force through these first two bubbles,
and we twist the two bubbles together exactly as if we were doing a pinch-twist. Just like this.
And we continue with each pair of bubbles that follow. Here we are at the fourth series of bubbles
and it's always exactly the same: we introduce the large bubble of balloon segments remaining
between two bubbles facing each other, pushing the air a little so as not to hinder the movement,
and we make sort of a double pinch-twist, Now, to solidify everything, we are going to fold back the bubble
of the remaining balloon segment and make it travel in the opposite direction. It will simply
follow the groove of the ear bubbles and go the other way. So twirl it
around the bubbles once in a while and all that will secure our series of pinch-twists.
This technique allows us to make a series of pinch-twists, side by side, which follow each other very
solidly, and which will allow us to attach the spider's legs to the body. This is what
you should get at this point. Keep the two small length of balloon remaining, because they
will allow us to hang the eyes of the spider a little later. We are now going to
prepare the legs of the spider. Each twisting balloon will allow us to make two legs.
So we need margin on both sides of the balloon. For this we will inflate the
twisting balloon not at the mouth of the balloon, but at the level of the arrow, at a level of about 3 or 4 fingers.
So we're going to use the same technique we learned with the butterfly and the ladybug.
And here I have extra room on both ends of the balloon.
OK... we continue with the next two legs.
Always the same, we make sure to leave a margin on both sides of the balloon.
The third series of two legs...
There you go!
And the fourth series of two legs, always the same, leaving a margin at both ends
of the balloon. We are now going to make the two small kinds of mandibles
that are very close to the eyes of the spider, which are actually called pedipalps,
for this we cut a balloon in two, but as before, we are not going to inflate it straight from
the start. We must leave a small margin, less important than for the
large legs, but we will leave a small margin on both sides of the end of this
half-balloon . Here... like that! OK... now we're going to put it all together,
starting with the pedipalps. Divide the balloon into two equal parts and introduce the
middle fold between the first series and the second series of pinch-twists, starting from the knot.
We continue with the first series of legs that we divide in two... That's it!
Always the same, we introduce the middle fold between the two following series of pinch-twists.
Remember, don't force the bubble through the pinch-twists,
but use a circular motion, sort of like rolling that big
bubble around the fold between these two pinch-twists. And we continue like this and so on
with the four series of two legs, which will make us eight legs and two pedipalps.
Regularly, we reposition our legs so that they are locked in
the most harmonious way possible. Here it is, like this! You see how they
are positionned inside, they are securely locked on all sides.
Come on, let's continue! So the third set of legs...
and we put the fourth and last set of two legs. This is what you should
get at this point. Now let's move on to the eyes of the spider. We are going to divide the
black twisting balloon roughly into 3 equal parts, and we cut off one part. We tie a knot
and inflate it. So always the same, we inflate the balloon, making sure to leave a small
margin on both sides of our bubble. The size of our bubble should correspond to two eyes.
And now I'm going to split this little oval bubble in half. Like so ! And we are going to make eyes,
just like we did, for example, the eyes of the lion.
We tie a knot,
two knots.
We now resume our series of legs and we will attach the eyes directly in front
of the legs. You should know that the spider has no thorax or head. It has a cephalothorax,
that is, a thorax and a head combined together, from which the four legs and
the two small pedipalps come out. This is why we attach the two eyes directly in the middle
of the two pedipalps. Now, the little bits of black balloon and the little bits of red balloon
that remain after the knots will be very useful to us. All you have to do is wrap them around the
first series of pinch-twists to lock them securely - and it's important you'll see
why afterwards - to attach the two eyes very firmly to the cephalothorax of our spider. Let's
now take the last red balloon that we are going to inflate about three quarters of the way, no more!
We will now attach this balloon to the back of the cephalothorax between the
last two sets of pinch-twist bubbles we did. Here it is, like this! We are
now going to make a large bubble at the level of the spider's eyes... like this!
And we're going to insert the fold of this big bubble at the base of both eyes. As usual,
performing circular movements. That's it... OK, let's continue! We turn around, here...
Now we make a second bubble of the same size which will allow us to return
to the back of the spider's cephalothorax, and we will block it at the level of the last two
pinch-twists. Now we flip our spider and we'll do the same on
the other side. So a big bubble that allows us to get to the eyes of the spider,
and we're also going to pass it through the fold between the eyes and the rest of the cephalothorax.
Then, we go back and we make a second bubble to finish and come back at the rear
of the cephalothorax, and we block the remaining balloon segment at the level of the last two
pinch-twists. We are now going to wrap this last large bubble
around the cephalothorax passing between the two eyes. Look... like this... We get
to the rear and we attach it to the last two pinch-twists. So, there... I'm lucky,
it was just the right size. But if you have too much balloon left, well, you will have to cut off the excess balloon:
you make a last bubble of the right size and then you cut off what is
too much. If you don't have enough balloon on the other hand, you will have to cut the entire
remaining segment of balloon and take another red twisting balloon just to make this winding around the cephalothorax. Well
now we arrange all that correctly so that the bubbles look more or less harmonious.
On this side it's not very thick, but on this side it's thicker,
so I'm going to push the air a little, so that it goes to the other side. So that they are
both more or less the same. Like this... Look... Here! We are now going to inflate
the round balloon to make the spider's abdomen. So for the size, it's up to you... it can
be bigger or smaller. You may want to consult the photo of a real spider, to be sure
that the proportions between the cephalothorax and the abdomen are well respected. And we're
going to use the last two pinch-twists to anchor our abdomen to the cephalothorax.
So I started at the mouth of the balloon and now I continue to roll the balloon around so
that the knot of the round balloon is hidden in the crease. Here it is, like that... in the fold of the pinch-twist.
Good, well hey! We're almost done!
We are now going to shape the legs and the pedipalps. What we use
is very simple: it's the technique of making angles in balloons.
If the air ever disappears completely from the angle you are making,
you just have to keep the position of your hand and push the air back towards this angle by pressing
on the end of the ball. Come on, let's continue! OK, let's do the other side now.
So you notice that I don't worry about the length of the legs, we'll see all that
later. For the moment you have legs that are of slightly different sizes depending on the
margins we left on each side, and if we divided the large bubbles evenly in two at the start.
So, you see that from time to time I not only make angles, but I
also make curves, to reproduce the shape of the legs of a spider.
We are now going to make sure that all the legs are approximately the same size,
and for this we are going to choose the shortest ball of all 8 legs. Here it is!
What we're going to do is we're going to compress some air back into it and
tie a knot. And now we're going to use this leg as a template for
the size of all the other legs. Inevitably as it is the shortest,
all the others will be too long and we will just have to shorten them. So to cut
a bubble you must not cut right in the middle of the bubble, you must cut at a place in the bubble
where there is not much pressure: for example just at the edge of a knot, like I just did.
Come on, let's keep going. We always follow the size of a leg that is of the right length...
there you go! We do not hesitate to retake the proper measurement several times if need be,
and we cut the balloon, always where there is the least pressure so that it does not explode.
Here, to be able to cut without exploding the bubble, I push all the air back,
and I create a surface of latex which is not under pressure so that I can pierce it.
Let's continue, always respecting the starting template.
And we end... with the last pedipalp.
Now you should know that spiders can have up to 8 eyes and sometimes there are even some spiders
that don't have any eye at all. For this one, we're going to do 4 eyes. So we take back the black balloon
we used before, and we cut what's left in half. We make a knot to be able to
inflate in it. Ah well this one… has a proper end, so there's no need to tie a knot. OK,
let's inflate them both right at the end and tie a knot. So you should have
a very short side...a very short margin and a slightly longer margin.
Do the same with the other balloon.
Now the ideal is to cut the shortest bit. Keep the
longest bit of latex so that we can use it to lock the eyes in the cephalothorax. And you will see that
on each side of an eye and a pedipalp, there will be a small place to block this second
small bubble. Now the result... our little spider is finished! Well, I hope
you enjoyed this tutorial, see you soon for another lesson… with Môssieur Ballooooooon!!!