Swingin' on the gallows pole!

Finished my gibbet cage and gallows pole! Still need to paint the cage, and stain the gallows pole! :( Stuff isn't progressing along as much as I'd like, but come Halloween I'm probably going to be the only one that will notice.. Such is life! Been having fun building props, but my budget isn't as carefree as it once was, so I will have to get more creative than normal instead of going down and buying materials it's more of what I have on hand! The gallows pole was one exception because it cost $22 in materials to make! It is a bit too big, but I was building it at my Grandpa's house, so it looked tiny in the driveway!! The pole is 8' tall and the arm is nearly 4' long! I added a base at the bottom that is currently covered by some of the Pirate flags I've collected over the years, but the side braces are a total of 5' long and the front one is 3', so the floor space the pole takes up is massive, but I didn't want a chance of it falling over. After Halloween is over I will probably trim up the prop, so it can *hopefully* take residence along side Captain Sparrow YEAR ROUND! :)

I bought some PVC pipe to make a bunch of candles a la How To Haunt Your House .com and this will keep me tied over for the next few nights.

I also bought some burlap sacks and I'm planning on painting an East India Trading company logo on them for some more maritime flair and filler props. I've yet to paint on burlap, so this should be interesting. I'm leaning towards making a stencil and just using spray paint, but we will see! I'll post whatever method works best for me!

Happy Haunting!

It talks!

Got to play around with my cage today and I got the Scary Terry servo by Cowlacious installed and ready to go! It's not a three axis skull that are all the rage today, but they are still very effective! The audio needs to be redone and touched up in Audacity, but that will be a project for another day! Hopefully I can come up with a routine so my Helmsman and Prisoner can talk to each other! The skeleton drinking on the barrel is just going to loop to the Drinking Pirate from the Disneyland Pirates of the Caribbean soundtrack.

I have some Drylok that I use to paint the tombstone, but I think the sandy gritty texture applied to the metal cage and then painted black with a faux rust patina the cage will be complete! Now I just have to determine what I want the gallows pole to look like.. decisions.. decisions.. I want it not to be so large that it over takes the living room, but because the prop is close to 60 lbs it needs to be able to support it! Enjoy the short clip! Hopefully the next update he will be stained, cage painted, and the base to hold said cage will also be finished! 

Gibbet Cage

It's unfortunately been a solid month or two with absolutely no prop building, so today to much delight.. I managed to squeeze in a solid seven hours of unadulterated prop building madness. I have an extra Scary Terry servo and I wanted to make another talking skeleton in addition to my Helmsman, so I've been itching to make a Gibbet Cage ever since seeing Pirates of the Caribbean Dead Mans Chest! The scene where they were hauling a prisoner over a bridge lined with gibbet cages and rotting corpses has been stuck in my head for some time. To further inspire me Dave Lowe has a similar build going on for his Decembers Forgotten Prisoner.

After scouring Halloween Forum for a decent tutorial or dimensions I decided to just wing it because most of the cages are built for a standing blucky. I love the look, but making a gallows pole to hang a 6' skeleton would have to be ridiculously big and take up a more space than I have, so I decided to make the skeleton sitting down. I did come across a tutorial where they were using PVC molding to make the strips, but the buckys are pretty heavy, so that was out of the question. I then found a tutorial I had buried away on my computer save for the images, so I was lucky enough to find a working PDF version that can be found HERE! Brian Lorsung originally designed the tutorial for I believe the anatomical chart company and their 33" bargain bucky using chain link tension strips for the metal. I found 6' lengths at my local home depot and I made my cage using the tension bars and some nuts and bolts! The tutorial is worth a read even if you don't stick to the dimensions. Hopefully once I make the crane/gallows pole it will be able to be displayed year round next to my Helmsman!

I still need to paint/age the cage and bucky. I may have him holding a lantern for some much needed ambient lighting. If I can afford some cheap pirate costumes I'll go that route, or maybe I'll buy some striped pirate socks and cut up some rags for rotted clothing. It will be fun scouring through thrift stores for anything that resembles maritime attire.

I still have a ton of work to do for a decent display, but I feel like this is what I needed to get me kick started! I also picked up a full size whiskey barrel and a water pump too! I have one more bucky left and I'm going to make a rum drinking pirate sitting on top of a barrel. If I have enough time I have an extra wiper motor and maybe I can rig up one of his legs to move up and down.. But the majority of both projects should be completed by next week!

New surroundings!

Sadly, there has been a horrible lack of updates and progress to anything remotely related to prop building or Halloween and that's because I've been in the middle of moving! Now that the monumental task of me hauling out all my belongings (borderline hoarder) I have a place of my own to call home. The misses even let me have my Jack Sparrow Helmsman be the focal point of our living room (whoo hoo!) :) The line was drawn at hanging my Ouija boards affixed to any wall, but they are still allowed to be displayed in the bedroom! Between moving and work, I haven't had time to work on a single project and I'm getting anxious. I'm still getting settled down into my new abode, but I am itching at working on stuff I had planned to already have finished.

Halloween this year won't be that grand, but I plan on sticking the Helmsman on the porch with a pirate flag and other assorted Pirate props and it will be a start :) Already been scoping out the neighborhood and it looks like there are plenty of kids out and about, so hopefully I will eventually become a staple on Halloween night. My room always has a Halloween feel to it, so it's won't be a huge deal not going absolutely crazy this year! Around November the Christmas decorations come out and my house becomes an homage to The Nightmare Before Christmas, so I still get to keep all my Halloween props out, but I just add a little of that Tim Burton Nightmare flare to it and it ties it all together!

I even have a small storage shed I am hoping to convert into a *SMALL* work shop. It should be awesome to finally be able to decorate an entire house instead of just my room! The living room is going to be devoted to all things Pirates and the Dining room is going to have an Alice in Wonderland vibe, so I have my work cut out for me!

Until the next update here are some pictures of my new place,

My Book/DVD/Pirate/Mansion shelf of wonders. Awesome

Haunted Mansion elevator painting done by a close friend of

mine!! 

The first Ouija board I made with directions from www.howtohauntyourhouse.com

Bed/Dresser/ Comfy red Chair and my Nightmare Storage Box!

Second Ouija board and my nightlight a Steampunk inspired lamp!