HALLOWEEN VIDEO

Video of our Halloween display.

HALLOWEEN 2009

Halloween was a BLAST! We put everything up in about 4 hrs. and took it down in about an hour. Crazy I know. All that work for one night. But it was totally worth it.

Here's a view of the cemetery. This shot makes it look a little sparse. But it did really fill most of the front yard.

We had quite a few colored flood lights throughout the cemetery. In fact we had concerns when we were hooking up all the electrical that we'd blow a fuse.


You can see the Hallowindow in the background.

Our demon looked great in the center of the cemetery.

Though all you can see is a blur but we had a moving skeleton hanging out near the tree.

Here's some views of the front porch area.


We got a black light this year and hung it under the porch overhang. We hung our white ghost and a bunch of white material. We also added tons of spider webs. The whole front door glowed.

HALLOWINDOW

We've got our window animation up and running and it looks great. We discovered Hallowindow about two years ago. All you need is is a sheet hung in an inside window, the animation DVD, a DVD playe and a projector.

Here is our dining room window with the animation projected onto the sheet.

Notice how the words are projected backwards. From the outside they read correctly. The DVD has options that allow you to flip the animation.

Here is a REALLy bad photo from the outside. I just took a quick shot. It was windy and my shutter speed was super slow because of the dark. A tripod would have helped but I was to lazy. I'll get a better shot on Halloween night. We'll have a different animation that night.

DEMON / WITCH

This year we are adding an animated demon and skeleton. This is a first for us. We did some research and found some great tutorials on line that walk you right through the process.

First we started with PVC and made the frame of the body. Bought a foam head and added a mask. The head had a whole in the bottom which fit perfectly over the PVC. We then attached him to our heavy umbrella stand.

We took an old sweater and pulled it over the frame of the body. We then stuffed it with brown packing paper and tied string around the waist to hold it all together. This gave him a chest and makes him look not so wimpy. We added last years Grim Reaper cloak over the sweater stuffed with paper.

We bought some Halloween rubber gloves and put wire inside them so we could bend the fingers around the broom stick. The wire is then shoved up inside the PVC.

I didn't get a chance to take any pics of the rigging of the motor. But this is what it looks like inside the cauldron. We used a windshield wiper motor. We also drilled out a large whole in the cauldron to pump in fog from our fog machine. Just used more PVC for this.


I threw some of that tattered cheese cloth like stuff that you can buy anywhere right now, over his shoulders. So this is what he looks like with the lights on.

And here he is with the lights off. I have only a red flood light lighting him up. We also added LED lights for eyes, one of those battery powered strobe lights inside the cauldron and orange xmas lights around the base. Once he's outside we'll have twigs wrapped around those lights. I love the effect the strobe light and fog give off. And we weren't anticipating the beams of light shooting from his eyes. It's a cool effect from the LED lights and the fog.

I will be getting video of this guy when we set him up outside.

CAULDRON

Our plan is to have a witch standing in the yard stirring the cauldron. But with or without the witch this cauldron will have dry ice inside as well as a small strobe light inside. The base it is sitting on will have orange twinkle lights inside of it along with twigs around it. I'll need to go pick up some broken tree limbs in the woods behind the house.

This is your typical cheap plastic cauldron, I picked this one up at Target. Not very creepy looking.

Decided to paint it. Took a gold paint pen and painted the handles on the sides. I also used black and brown flat spray paint to paint the cauldron. I didn't like the shininess of the black plastic. I then went back and dripped white and grey paint over the top of it. Had a chain left over from a hanging light in the house so I painted it and wrapped it around the rim.

NEW TOMBSTONE

My goal each year is to make at least one tombstone. Back in June I took a trip with some co-workers to Union Hill Cemetery near downtown KC. One of the oldest cemeteries in the area. I took lots of pictures for reference. I was kind of intrigued with the tombstones that had these urn shapes on top. So I decided I'd do a much simpler version for my tombstone this year.



Just like most people who make theie own tombstones, I use the blue insulation foam. I use the 1" and 2". I use plain old wood glue and toothpicks to hold the whole thing together.

Then I get out the stinky hot exacto knife and start carving. You must do this in a ventilated area. It's unbelievably stinky and I'm sure toxic. After the carving I add caulk (any acrylic caulk will do) to the seams. This helps reinforce it. You can also use the caulk as texture.


Now is the fun part. Painting. I used a tinted primer as my base. Then I start adding my darker grays with a sea sponge. This sponge leaves great texture. And check out the awesome urn I found at Lowes for $3.40. It was originally $25.00. Now is a great time to find pots really cheap since it's the end of summer. I can't decide if I'll actually glue this down.

And here it is all complete. It stands 40" tall and is 11" wide at the base. I need to add something to the plaque as well as glue on Spanish moss.