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In recent days, social media has been abuzz with photos and short videos capturing a massive tiger appearing in an HCM City alley. In one clip, a young man leads the large tiger into a house.

Meanwhile, other images show the young man standing, sitting, petting, or playing with the ‘king of the jungle’. Some photos feature children riding on the back of the fierce-looking tiger as it glares and shows its teeth.

The photos and videos quickly garnered numerous comments and shares from people expressing surprise and excitement.

Many people guessed that the images were created by AI, while others insisted it was a 100 percent handmade tiger model.

The tiger is a model crafted by artist Vo Duc Du, born in 1995, from Binh Thanh District in HCM City. Du said it was made on a 1:1 scale based on the Bengal tiger from India.

“I created this tiger to test my skills and creativity before tackling another project several times larger,” Du said.

The product is made from foam, cement, and synthetic fur. Every step, from shaping, mixing colors, painting, and attaching fur, was done by hand over nearly a month.

“This was my first time making such a model, so I made many mistakes. I had to redo it multiple times to get a satisfying result,” Du said.

He said that every step of creating the tiger required an artistic eye, high creativity, and strong visualization. He also spent a lot of time researching and refining the model’s appearance to make it resemble a real animal.

After creating the desired shape, Du attached synthetic fur, mixed colors, and spray-painted the iconic striped pattern of the “king of the jungle”.

“The hardest part was painting the face, eyes, and creating expressions to give the model a lifelike spirit. This was crucial to making it vivid and realistic.

“In the video, I used effects to make the model appear to move, so viewers couldn’t tell if it was real or fake. That’s why the video attracted over 1 million views,” Du said.

After completing the model, Du placed it in the alley for locals to see, drawing many curious onlookers.

Some people said that seeing the model unexpectedly startled them as it was difficult to distinguish from a real tiger at first glance.

Adults visit to take photos, and children also like playing with the fake tiger. The kids were thrilled when Du let them ride on the model’s back.

Ha Nguyen