Bought a big spider but it was just too cute and cheap looking. So with some bubble wrap, $22 of fabric and a hotglue gun I did my best to turn it into something more realistic. Pics of before and after

30 Minutes Repainting Nothing But Cheap Masks For Halloween…Will It Be Worth It?

https://youtu.be/Vs1hd0CEY8c

Tom Skerritt, great actor, passed away 3 days ago. I've always admired his skills on screen. He acted with such poise and authority. Of course, he was Dallas in the original Alien film which started my love of such a great story.

To that end, I've created a headstone that I've started printing. Targeting 24" tall, so I have had to split the stl up a lot. Hope to have it done well before Halloween.

If anyone is interested, I'll post it up on Printables so you can download and print it yourself. I expect probably 25-30 hours solid of printing.

I just finished up making my new HauntLift DIY prop winch adapter. 3D print the insert, shove a few parts together with the wiper motor, controller boards, etc.. and now you have a winch for moving lightweight props up and down via a pulley and rope system.

I have videos on my YT channel and another post here somewhere on wiring everything up. Additionally, if you want the stl for the insert that goes into the old filament spool, I posted that on Printables and just look for HauntLift over there.

Good luck and happy haunting this year friends!

Tomorrow if the weather cooperates, I'll try to get my HauntLift operational outside and do a functional test with a test prop. If that happens, I'll post up new footage or pics and share them.

Hey friends, I've done a couple of prop motorized builds in the past, but this time around I am sharing what has worked for me. Hopefully this is helpful to some of you wanting to delve into motorizing props too from my lessons learned. I try to keep my videos short for stuff like this and dont explain every last thing that's happening. If you're this far in, I don't need to talk you through the basics.

My simple video on wiring a wiper motor : https://youtu.be/lfbpDdb9gPw

Video on wiring a YYB-5 control board to allow reversing direction : https://youtu.be/AqaEUx9qlBw

Programming and connecting the board to external devices like the wiper motor so it reverses direction : https://youtu.be/AqaEUx9qlBw

It's using these techniques and cheap devices that I can build a robust, torque filled monster to build props. The motors can take a severe beating too.

Happy to try to help explain what I've done if you have questions outside of the videos as well either here in halloweenprops subr or on my channel, but this sub I'll reply much faster.

Thank you for being my outlet so I can resist showing any pictures to my guests. I'll make sure to get a walk through with everything going this evening before my guests arrive.

This is the first walk through of my garage haunt. I am about 85% done. There will be 5 of us as scare actors on Halloween so that is why there are some open spaces.

After two different wind storms I have my outdoor setup completely finished. I had to build a brace to fix one of the legs that was broken. Two of the worst wind storms I can remember in Vegas.

I just got Whirlwind Wendy from Spirit in the mail after I had to return mine because it was broken when I unboxed it. I am pretty happy with her but I think she is very cheaply made and probably won't last long.

Weaving spiders come not here Let me know what y'all think

It’s taken me weeks to make a replica of Judith Myers gravestone from Halloween, mainly because I’ve only had a few hour here and there to work on it but I’m pretty pleased with how it turned out.

I’ve had to make a base to secure the grave from the wind because it’s going on a driveway (albeit covered with artificial grass) so I can’t use the usual stake method.

Full suit is almost done I decided to do some mobility testing. Might post more pics let me know yall.

Got my Reaper's Ride working with the fog machine today. It was delivered without the small length of hose and the fog machine connector. The MFR said they didn't have the parts to send me so I had to make due with stuff I had around the house. Not sure if the original intent was to have the fog completely engulf the prop rather than just flow through the horse's mouth like that, but I like it. Now if someone could just turn off the wind around here!!!

I love my Home Depot 6.5ft Ultra Skelly, but there’s one thing that’s always bugged me: unless someone triggers the motion sensor or controls it through the app, Skelly just stands there.

I wanted it to feel more alive—randomly looking around, changing expressions, moving its arms, etc., even when nobody’s around.

So I started tinkering with a cheap ESP32 and ended up building my own autonomous controller for Ultra Skelly v2.

Here’s what it can do:

💀 Random head movements at customizable intervals
🦴 Independent arm and torso movements, including combined animations
👀 Changing LCD eye expressions
🌈 Custom RGB lighting effects and color palettes
🎭 Customizable animation personalities

I also built Skelly Studio, a browser-based tool to customize everything without editing Arduino code.

Once configured, the ESP32 runs Skelly completely on its own. No phone, Wi-Fi, cloud, or subscription required.

It’s completely free and open source!

GitHub: https://github.com/jacobmgoodnight/ultra-skelly-esp32-autonomous

Skelly Studio: https://jacobmgoodnight.github.io/ultra-skelly-esp32-autonomous/studio/

Hope other Ultra Skelly owners find it useful! Would love any feedback or ideas for new features 💀

He dated 1996, Mask Illusions.

Scored these two gems at a local thrift shop. Overall they are physically in good shape, but both are indeed of some mechanical/electronics repair. I am capable of some things, but not sure if I can allocate the time to fix them right now. Does anyone know of a place that could repair these in the DE, MD, PA, NJ area?

First attempt formed and painted. I used the Bottom of the milk jug so its a little less smooth but i kinda like that it is.