Detailed designs
Well, by now we knew we had monkeys on the float, a gorilla, a screaming mother bird, and a baby elephant - but how did they relate to each other size-wise, and what details would they have? That was the next stage of the process, along with working out all of the floral requirements.
One of the members built this little model so we could better visualize sight-lines and size relationships.
Our sponsor's name would be made out of bananas to befit our jungle theme.
Our gorilla at the front of the float was effortlessly pumping the water through all of the hoses with just one finger, while happily munching on a ripe banana. We like to add little touches like this to keep the viewers entertained as their eyes jump from element to element. The smaller monkeys would fly up and down as they hung on for dear life.
Our "Howler monkey" is acting as the fire department's siren. I'd be howling too if someone was spinning one of my appendages around. This drawing helped with the height relationship between the different type of monkeys, but it also gave us some ideas for their hat design.
We feel it's important to have a good "closing act" to our floral story, and our baby elephant more than filled that role. He should have been working a bit harder on trying to put out the fire but it looks like he was enjoying himself out there.
Next came the hard part - actually building all of these designs.