Neat Homebrew Halloween Tech?

aibrahim asks: "I just saw a proton pack (alternate site) a friend has built. It made me wonder what other neat high tech things the Slashdot crowd might be brewing up for the coming holidays. What I am really after is stuff that one of you made, better yet would be diagrams or explanations of how you made it. Doesn't have to be a costume item, anything interesting that fits the season would do." This is a follow-up to the earlier article. So what are you dressing up as for Halloween, and how do you plan on making your costume interesting?

Comments

Cheap projects to entertain the neighborhood...

[stefanlasiewski]

I don't really care about people's costumes. I want to know more about your Halloween _projects_. What cheap, creative ways are you using to decorate your house?

Here's an easy way to haunt up your front porch for less then $25. The neighborhood kids love it.

Last halloween I bought 10 pounds of dry ice from a local industrial chemical supply store for about $10. I placed the dry ice in a cheap black 5 gallon "witches cauldron", which I got from the local Haloween store.

To create the fog, I simply placed the ice in the cauldron, and periodically added warm water when I saw trick-or-treaters. The warm water melts the ice, and you get fog.

The dry-ice provided enough fog rolling down my front steps to freak out the neighborhood kids. This fog lasted approximately 4 hours.

For added effect, I placed a couple of those green and red glow sticks inside the cauldron (Since glow sticks glow less when cold, I placed the sticks on a pedestal above the cold ice and water), and added some reflective alluminum foil to enhance the glow.

As an added effect, I replaced my porch light with a black light, and added a bunch of those green-spiderwebs from the halloween store.

This gave the whole porch a nice eerie glow, especially with the green-glow eminating from the cauldron. The fog trickling down the stairs is a great and cheap effect, especially with flickering candle light from the jack-o-lanterns.

Whole cost of this operation, including dry ice $1 a pound), cauldron ($5 at the drug store), black light ($2 at hardware store), glow sticks ($2 each), spiderwebs ($3 a pack), pumpkins ($3 each) was probably $25. I'm going to do the same thing this year.

Re:Cheap projects to entertain the neighborhood...

[chaobell]

Couple of years ago, I'd just changed jobs and dough was scarce. This was also about the time Blair Witch was big. So, to decorate the balcony of my apartment, I made a trip to the vacant lot across the street, gathered up a bunch of sticks, and made little Blair Witch stick-men to hang off the balcony. I the proceeded to root through my remnant bag and rip off strips of fabric to tie on them, as if someone had tied a piece of some poor sap's clothing to them. Apparently, I started a fad, as they were all over the building the next day.

Cost: free.

But that wasn't quite enough.

We had a dead Tiki torch. I had a bunch of raggedy-ass old clothes. I had more plastic grocery bags than I knew what to do with.

Stuffed the pants with bags. Ran Tiki torch down one leg. Stuffed shirt with bags. Crammed shirt onto top half of Tiki torch. Dressed shirt-and-pants up in coat, scarf (to hide the fact that it had no face--it didn't particularly need one, as you'll see in a minute), and stocking cap. Stuffed "hands" in pants pockets, turned him to face the corner. Lashed bits of him to the railing with fishing line. Ta da! Mike standing in the corner!

Cost: free for me; might cost you $10.

Finally, I used the clothed-and-bags trick once more a year later. Stuffed pants and shirt, sat in chair. Got hold of styrofoam wig head. Ripped head off neck, stuffed neck in shirt, buttoned shirt. Liberally squirted fake blood over all. Dipped blade of cheap kiddie scissors in glue, jabbed into styrofoam. Made sign for poor guy to hold: "Mommy TOLD me not to run with scissors."

Great list of homebrew halloween projects

[stefanlasiewski]

There's a whole homebrew Halloween subculture out there.

Here's a great Halloween Project List with diagrams and everything.

Some of the projects cheap, easy and can be done in an hour (and you still have a few days left).

Other projects are more involved, like building a IR motion detector to detect trick-or-treaters and set off some effect (like a fog machine) further up the path, the famous flying crank ghost projects, glowing ghosts, you name it. I mean, come on, haven't you always wanted to build your own electric arc (jacobs ladder)" that you see in Frankenstein's Labratory???

My haunting experiences...

[SablKnight]

I feel at least a little capable of discussing this, since I've been haunting my house for 3 years now. The key to good haunting, IMHO, is to never use store-bought things unmodified. It doesn't take much. I do break this rule in the website I reference above, since it doesn't have this year's pictures on it yet. Look for trends; effects that used to cost a lot of money are getting cheap and easy, like fog machines (a fog chiller is a must), fake flames (replace the cloth part, the default ones are terrible). These things are slowly becoming mainstream --unfortunately, since people can spot a store-bought effect much more easily, but fortunately because they are much more available and affordable.

I dislike moving props. They almost always look fake and mechanical unless you do a really good job. The only one I have is the Flying Crank Ghost mentioned above, that I built from a windshield wiper motor and various hardware. This is mounted in my balcony, running from below with fishing line so that none of the mechanism is visible. My personal goal is to have a mostly static setup with such a terrifying ambiance that trick-or-treaters refuse to get their candy.

Some quick tips:
* Know your location -- some things work well where others wouldn't. I've got a cheap winged-skull clock that fits perfectly in a space on my balcony; it wouldn't work in a lot of houses.
* Skulls, skulls, skulls -- possibly the best decorating element ever. Buy them by the dozen. I like Bucky skulls myself. Be creative. Use gel stains to age them, melt candles on them, stick spikes through them, layer lunchmeats on them for parties.
* Thunder and lightning machines are great. Hook up some spotlights and a thunder cd with some cheap subwoofers and you'll get everyone's attention.
* Ignore the infamous ten-foot rule. TOTs get really close to your props, make them believable from inches away.

I've slacked off a little this year, I still have some things left to construct. Use the monsterlist referenced above, it's a lifesaver. Join Halloween-L (www.wildrice.com/halloween-l to sign up) for lots of great tips. Be creative, work with what you have available.

Happy hauntings, and may all your dreams be nightmares
-SablKnight