Boris Texture

This is the proposed skin texture for my troll, sort of a leathery elephant-like hide in a nice troll green. 


Not one hundred percent sold but I've got a week or so before I need to make the decision. 


Troll assembly will start tomorrow, here's hoping everything continues to go according to plan.

Amazing

I have heard nothing but positive comments about this production and after seeing this I understand why....simply amazing.

Sometimes beauty is very simple.

Thanks Hun!

Every now and then my wife surprises me with some sort of goodness and in this case its Disney’s 1974 Trick or Treat LP from Disneyland Records picked up at our local Goodwill.

I love it.

Halloween Records are hard to come across, Christmas albums outnumber Halloween albums probably 1,000 to 1 in the thrift stores.

Years of browsing bins of albums in thrift stores and garage sales have only yielded me over a dozen finds.

Love the record and love you!

Thanks.

33EEEE

The feet for my troll....my guess is that they are about size 33EEEE, at that rate a good pair of Nike shoes would cost him over $400...good thing he doesn't run much!


The finishing texture prior to paint will be PVA Glue and Joint Compound then imprinted with a loose weave burlap texture...sort of lizard like skin.

Boris Resumed

The weather is supposed to start warming up this coming week so I plan on resuming work on Boris The Bolter troll for downtown Midland.

Everything is basically done except the feet which I mapped out this morning.

After a trip to Lowes to buy plywood for the base and feet plus a bunch of expanding spray foam I will get to work.

I’ve gotten a little anxious with this project as it has sat idle since the first week of March.

The game plan is to have the troll completed by the end of April.

Thanks Chris!

I felt quite beautiful and a bit naughty in my new GITD handcuffs and witch fingers, thank you Chris for the blog contest! 

Shelved

As I was working in the basement tonight I took a moment and looked behind me at the shelves lined with unfinished projects.

Armatures, experiments and pieces that just didn’t quite make the final cut, reminders of projects once filled with excitement and now just gathering dust.

Every time we have maintenance folks venture into our basement I wonder what they must be thinking.

Does the furnace guy think he’s wandered into the lair of a serial killer.

Do the sewer guys think they took a wrong turn at Albuquerque?

These unfinished pieces do serve an important purpose; besides being reminders of ideas that have come and gone they are useful for experimentation.

Today I played with a new surface technique and as luck would have it I was able to grab a skull off the shelf and test the new material.

Cheers to my shelves of past history; the skulls, the shark, masks, the pumpkins and everything else that lies in wait for their chance to see daylight.

Wall of Survivors

This is something I had totally forgotten about.

Shift the Wayback Machine to 1993 when my soon-to-be wife and I created a commercial haunted house called “Danger County Mine”, an abandoned gold mine adventure where the guests traveled through dilapidated shafts in search of lost miners only to encounter an array of haunted house scares.

The whole experience was fun and we managed to pretty much break even and have enough money left over to treat our friend and family volunteers to dinner and drinks.

A free meal for three days and nights of hard work, what a deal.

Anyway.

At the conclusion of the haunt we gave our guests a chance to immortalize their journey by signing our “Wall Of Survivors.”

The “Wall” was large sheets of paper attached to the wall next to the exit and it was something that our guests really seemed to enjoy.

Scribbled on the sheets were signatures as well as a variety of messages and shout outs.

This idea would be fun for anyone to incorporate into their haunt or yard display, simply give your guests a chance to express themselves.

The cost is almost nothing (paper and some markers) and the result is a fun way for them to punctuate their experience and serves as a fun memento for you.

My wife and I looked over the rolls of paper and the signatures that were scribed almost 18 years ago with a mix of humor and sadness as many of those that cared enough to sign our wall have since passed.

Bittersweet to say the least.