I took out one of my Gargoyles I picked up this year at Sams Club. It’s by far one of the best off the shelf animated props I’ve ever invested in. It hit me up for just over $80 bucks each (yes I bought two of them) but I feel it’s definitely worth it. It has a small PIR in it’s chest which works pretty well. His eyes light in addition to actually having lids that open and close. The wings open up. And the head is covered with latex rubber painted very well to match the body. The rubber head allows the mouth to move realistically when it talks. It only has two blurbs that I’ve noticed.

Anyways, I set up a red light last night in front the columns in the back yard and hooked up one of the gargoyles to do a visual as well as PIR test and must say I’m pretty happy with the results which you can see below:

Tags: Columns, Gargoyle, Sams
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Work is almost completed on my new columns, a new addition I’m adding this year. They’ve been a lot of work, were a definite learning experience,  and have taken a lot more time than I thought. I’ve definitely bitten off more than I can chew this year but I’m trudging along and making a lot of progress. They still need a bit of aging done to them as well a couple other details. But overall I’m pretty satisfied with how they’re turning out.

I have managed to complete my scarecrow, Harry.  He was a lot of fun to put together and relatively quick to build. The part that took the longest actually was corpsing the skull and the ever annoying waiting game called “drying time”. The frame is just PVC painted with a tannish-brown spray paint with some branches tied on. The duster I picked up at a thrift store for about $16 bucks. The hat was $10 that I grabbed at iParty. The hat is a rather strange story. I found it on the top sheft with a bunch of other hats in the costume aisle. No one was around so I had to do a little jump to grab it and pull it down.  Turns out it didn’t have a price tag, they couldn’t find anymore, couldn’t verify if it was part of a costume or a prop, nothing in inventory. Ultimately the manager said “if ya really want it, $10 bucks its yours”.

Tags: Columns, Harry, Props, Scarecrow
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Swung by Christmas Tree Shoppes last night to pick up some new kitchen chairs and low and behold they have started to put out their Halloween goodies. A lot of cutsie stuff but I scored  4 bags of bones at 6.99 each and a haunted book at 4.99. Here’s some shots of whats up on their shelves:

Tags: Halloween, Stores
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Updated the basic layout of the yard in Visio. Still have a bit more planning to do as to what goes where. This does not include any additional ghoulies I may pick up retail when the goods go out. I’m still thinking about how I’m going to do the facade which my wife really wants to do this year.

Anyways, you can see the placement of some of the main props I have listed here so far. Jonny Rotten will be (if I get time) my first attempt at a Pumpkin Rot style scarecrow. The plan is to get him up in late September before the anything else… Kinda a preview.

Tags: Agnes, Beatrix, Joe Rombie, Lillian, Props, Pumpkin Rot, Yard
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Well we got a chance to go in to Yankee Candle and take some pics today. Can’t believe it, second week of August and they already have items from the Boney Bunch that sold out. The bride and groom are completely gone - unavailable, even on their website. Still kicking myself for not bringing my Stylus so again, pics aren’t that great. If you want to see their entire line in better quality, just head over to YankeeCandle.com and check it out. Here are the pics I took this evening:

Tags: Boney Bunch, Halloween, Stores
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Well I actually got around to dying her clothes today. I was hoping it would come out dark grey and it very well did. Draped it over her for a quick dress rehearsal. Also put a piece of 1/2 PVC in her hands where the scythe will be so you can get an idea of the final outcome. Gonna do a lighting test maybe this evening.

Tags: Beatrix, Costume, Props
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I finally got around to adding hands to Beatrix. I used 1/4 inch air tubing, 18 gauge wire, and masking tape. I’ve got this down to pretty much routine and while there’s quite a few tutorials already out there for making hands I’ll probably put up one of my own since my technique is a little different. No one technique is really better than the other and it’s really about what works best for you and I found this works for me.

You may have also noticed I experimented a tiny bit with her wardrobe. These are some pieces from Agnes’ set and I have yet to dye the cheese cloth.

I still have plenty of work to do on this prop and in the next few days I will take her outside, add some latex and cotton batting to the hands, fill in gaps of the torso with Great Stuff foam, give her a coat of primer then a coat of bone white. After all that dries gonna do some staining and corpsing as well. I still need to work on the face and paint it - especially considering the skull does not match the torso.

-TM

Tags: Beatrix, Props
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