Building

After two months of doing nothing whatsoever followed by two months of filmmaking, I'm happy to say that I've come full circle and am now working steadily on props again. My room stinks of PVA glue, I've got black paint under all my fingernails, I've collecting tree branches and hoarding them in my room, my carpet is covered in tiny bits of sticky masking tape... just the way it should be.

I'm working on a couple of new props for 'The Backs 2013' as well as a top-secret project that is soon to be revealed. Till then... teaser photos!

Seven Days...

Enter The Geisterbahn...

Bulb

A Dearth Of Pumpkins

As much as I ponder it, I can't think of a way to incorporate jack o'lanterns into my display this year without them feeling out of place. At the very least, this one (paper-mache) jacko will making an appearance.

The Ghost Train

It stood in the center of the abandoned amusement park, flooded in moonlight. The wooden beams holding up the front facade had begun to collapse. The once vibrant skulls and ghouls that adorned the ghost train were now cracked and faded. The years of rain and sea spray had rendered the building a sad ghost of its former self. There was no denying that the place was spooky, and most of the town kids had heard stories about the old ghost train being haunted, but very few knew the truth about what happened there many years ago, on one fateful Halloween night...

Image by Colin & Jacqui Hawkins

Propwork

I've been incredibly busy building props over the last few weeks, and haven't found any time for blogging.

Hopefully I'll get back into it soon.

Green Ghoul

Starting work on props for Marrow House 2012. There's going to be a whole lot of green this time round.

Hollow Sockets

I'm currently working on this years wind ghost - Sorrow. My first prop to incorporate hair.

Each year I make a new wind ghost that hangs in front of the window display on Halloween. Does that make Sorrow the first prop for Marrow House 2012?

I guess it does.

Glow

Marrow House 2012 is less than 6 months away.
Let the teasers begin.

Skulls

Crude crosses of wood were posted into the dry ground. Sticks tied together with rough twine jutted from the earth at odd angles. It looked like an old burial ground, a final resting place that was built before tombstones existed. From a time when two sticks lashed into a cross marked that a corpse lay in the soil below.


But what sort of people put the skulls of their dead on their gravemarkers?

Set-up and Blog Awards

I've been insanely busy over the past two days setting up my display. As normal, I'm only going to post a photo showing about a quarter of a prop.

With all these teaser pics, I'm sure you're all ready to unfollow me by now. Hold on a little longer. Just a little bit longer. Photos of Halloween 2011 will be up soon.

In other news, I've recieved another blog award!

Many thanks to Marilyn from the Art Bliss Blog for awarding me the...

Liebster ('dearest' in German) Blog Award!

The Rules for receiving and giving the award are as follows:

1. Thank the person who gave you the award and link to their blog.

2. Pass the award on to 5 blogs with less than 200 followers.

Five blogs I feel are worthy of this great award:

1. The Scarecrow's Post - Spooky rural photography, rustic scarecrows and a huge array of masks. Wonderful!

2. Scotty ART - The great blog of the great Stolloween. Such a cool original style in his props. (194 followers - only just made it in!)

3. Death to Halloween - A new blog showcasing incredible corpses made by VooDoo13! Those TEETH!

4. Johnnys Ghosts - Not updated often, but full of great tutorials and photos. Amazing ghosts and hands-down the best FCG I've ever seen.

5. The Haunted Closet - An awesome blog full of retro Halloween book illustrations, T.V. Halloween specials and other spooky old-school goodies.

Again, thanks heaps to Marilyn from the Art Bliss blog - I really appreciate it.

Seven days...

Halloween is one week away.
Prop-building is finally finished and I'm ready to set up my display in just a few short days.
The final prop of Marrow House 2011:

Good luck to all you spooks out there setting up haunts!

Spilt Innards

 

Three Teasers

Plaster Beak

Too busy to blog. All I've got for you at the moment is another teaser for Halloween 2011.

Long Weekend

And a very good one indeed.

I've been wanting (needing) to see Trick 'R Treat for a long, long time now. Unfortunately, due to the NZ Censorship System and parents, this hasn't happened. Well, this afternoon, my mum must have had a change of heart, she decided to let me see one of the very best horror films to date - Trick 'R Treat.

Image Source

I'm not much of an expert on movie reviews, but Trick 'R Treat was just too good not to.
The anthology plotline was smart, it was full of twists and none of the characters were what they seemed. The film was directed by Michael Dougherty, who is a yard haunter himself - pictures of his haunt can be seen here. His love for halloween and haunting really shows in this film. Every scene is packed with Jack O'Lanterns, yard haunts, scarecrows and monsters of all varieties. This is one movie I am sure to watch over and over again. And I have. I've watched it 5 times this weekend. It is GOOD.

It's hard to say what my favourite story was, but I think 'The Principal' and 'The Halloween School Bus Massacre' were my two favourites. The opening scene with Emma and Henry was brilliant, and the ending was jaw-dropping. My new favourite movie. Below are some screencaps I took.

I LOVED the inclusion of Scooby Doo on Zombie Island, as seen above. It is the first zombie film I ever saw, and possibly the first horror. I'll blog more about that another time.

Anyway, on with the weekend.

Prop-building is in full swing and I'm churning out ghouls for this year's haunt. A few teaser pics:

I've been listening to the new Florence and the Machine single obsessively - 'What the Water Gave Me'.

Her second album (still untitled) is being released on Halloween,

ohmygod,

and I've pre-ordered the deluxe edition at the Flotique. 

Lastly, I've made a few little ghosts inspired by the ones seen in Trick 'R Treat. They turned out looking a little bit like they were hanged - not sure if that's a good or bad thing.

Nachzehrer

The first great plague swept Europe in the 13^th Century. Thousands upon thousands of disease-ridden bodies were piled up in huge mass graves, known as ‘plague pits’. When there became less and less room for more pits, gravediggers resorted to digging up old graves and filling them with more rotting corpses. Townsfolk were highly superstitious at the time, and some blamed the plague on vampires and curses. When old plague pits were re-filled, it is said that gravediggers came across bloated bodies that appeared to have chewed through the white shroud covering their decaying faces. Rumours spread and villagers believed that the ‘Nachzehrer’ were lurking among the corpses in the ground. Nachzehrer are a German breed of vampire, and are much like zombies, though they would become restless in their graves and chew through their burial shrouds. When the cloth was not enough to satiate their hunger, they would begin to eat themselves, and eventually crawl from their graves to devour their relatives. 

The Hobby

The best hobby ever.

La Mort

Halloween 2011 Teaser #2

Image Source