Puppet Maker
Customize an animated character and get a unique puppet to use in your own creations. Puppet Maker lets you select a style, pick features like skin color and clothing, and generate a final optimized puppet.
Free example styles
You are free to download and use these styles however you want - no credit needed. To install a style, double-click on the .maker file to open it up directly into Puppet Maker.
Penn
Pencil, crayon, paintbrush — it’s up to you what this writing utensil looks like. Perfect for office or school themed cartoons. Created by Blandine Moceaer.
Rectangle
Who knew a rectangle could have so many options? Turn this character into a calculator, phone, notebook, or dozens of other right angled creations. Created by Blandine Moceaer.
Circle
From planets to a lightbulb, have fun customizing a rounded character with lots of color and feature options. Created by Blandine Moceaer.
Shoes
Sneakers, flip flops, boots and more — create a closet full of shoe themed characters. Created by Blandine Moceaer.
Otto
Create the custom car character of your dreams, including colors, wheels, and facial features. Created by Jackie Bauwens.
Sporty
Create a custom male or female sport playing character, including soccer, football, cheerleading, swimming, and many more. Created by Jackie Bauwens.
Hiro
A cartoon human character with plenty of customization options to achieve all sorts of distinct character looks. Created by Kevin McMahon.
Jackie
A cartoon human character with plenty of customization options to achieve all sorts of distinct character looks. Created by Kevin McMahon.
Nikki
A wonderfully stylized human character with a distinct flat shaded color palette and numerous expressions. Created by Nikki Goldberg.
Sharkey
A custom shark with several body and color types, and plenty of fun triggers including bubbles and a hula dance. Created by Kevin McMahon.
Whiskers
Lions, tigers, and cats — whatever kind of furry feline you’re looking to create, Whiskers is the maker file for you. Created by Kevin McMahon.
Mercer
A full body human character with plenty of customization options to create all sorts of interesting characters. Created by Keith Negley.
Tasty
A cute character that can be customized into all sorts of fun treats, from avocados to cupcakes. Created by Kevin McMahon.
Smiley
A simple emoji with custom colors and a wide range of different emotion states. Created by Kevin McMahon.
Utility Andy
Andy can be whatever occupation you want - barista, construction worker, doctor, fire fighter, and more. Created by Jackie Bauwens.
Blondyn The Brave
A highly customizable knight character with tons of different armor and weapon options. Perfect for your next roleplaying livestream. Created by Blandine Moceaer.
Terry
An old school animated character pack with a sepia tone & film grain filter option and animated background options. Created by Calvin O'Connor.
Frankie
A versatile seated character with armchair or wheelchair settings, along with unique animations like reclining and wheel spins. Created by Jackie Bauwens.
Salem
Make your own witch or wizard, complete with a set of spell and pose triggers. Created by Blandine Moceaer.
Caricature
A make-your-own caricature template with plenty of customization choices to make a character like whoever you want! Created by Daichi Ito.
Fuzzy
A fun fuzzy creature creator with plenty of options made out of real photographed objects. Created by Dovid Taub.
Gigi
A custom game playing character with plenty of options for commentating on your next gaming livestream. Created by Calvin O'Connor.
Drummer
A drumming character with several different character and kit options. Created by Mark Giles.
Figgy
A versatile character with parallax face features based off of the popular “Sticky” puppet. Created by Dovid Taub.
Bearie
An animated bear character with a plethora of customization options, from body type to fur color. Created by Carlos Gomez.
Puppetbot
Robot with customizable head, arms, torso, legs, and metal color. Press the on button trigger to activate special actions like a flamethrower or spinning buzzsaw.
How do I use Puppet Maker?
- Open it up. When you first open up Character Animator, click the button in the new middle card on the home screen to launch Puppet Maker. This will open up the Puppet Maker window. You can also reach this window by going to File > Open Puppet Maker.
- Choose a style. At the top you will see a selection of styles. Hover over the thumbnail to see a preview of its diverse options, or click one to preview it and view its detailed customization options. Instead of only allowing for one character style, Puppet Maker will allow creators from all over the world to make their own unique puppets. There are 11 built in styles, with plenty of others available online.
- Customize your puppet. In the Customize section, you can click icons to get a live preview of your custom character on the right. Or try clicking the Randomize button to quickly cycle through randomly selected options. There are no predetermined categories here — creators can make whatever categories they want, from tee-shirt designs to props.
- Play with triggers. The Play section includes triggers to test your puppet with, such as eyelid states, different backgrounds, and more. These will be the triggers you’ll see included in your final puppet as well.
- Generate. When you’re happy with your look, name your character in the upper-right corner and click the Generate button. Puppet Maker strips out all the unnecessary custom parts you didn’t select to make a lean, optimized Photoshop artwork file and Character Animator puppet. Now you can record, livestream, or do whatever you want with your new character. You can also further edit your character in Photoshop if you want to make additional changes.
Can I make my own Puppet Maker templates?
We are currently working with a small select group of partners to help bring a diverse set of styles to Puppet Maker. The authoring experience is currently quite complicated, and is only recommended for expert Character Animator puppet creators in its current iteration. We hope to make this process easy for everyone in the future.
If you are an experienced Character Animator user and are interested in making your own Puppet Maker template files, please fill out this Google Form. We will begin reaching out to small groups in the coming months as we continue to work on this feature.
Want to learn more about Character Animator?
- Watch our video tutorials to learn everything from getting started to advanced rigging at adobe.com/go/chtutorials.
- Download more free example puppets at adobe.com/go/chexamples and okaysamurai.com/puppets.
- There are several companies that sell puppets and puppet creation services. We've featured some of them (and more free puppets) at adobe.com/go/ch_examples_thirdparty_en.