The Darkest Hour: Video

Made a quick video this morning of our 2009 haunt. Hope everyone has a Happy Thanksgiving!

Stricken at Nightfall

I thought this picture turned out kind of cool. I took it while laying on the ground, looking up at the prop as the sun was setting behind it.

Lost on Halloween Night

This one fooled a few people... my mom came up and helped pass out candy on Halloween night, and she even talked to it a few times forgetting that it was just a prop I had placed there. Later on in the night, I moved it up closer to the road where all the parents usually stand. I saw a few of them try to have interactions with it as well. The kids reactions were the best though, when they realized that this was no ordinary kid they were talking to.
As it appeared Halloween night.

Grim Hollow 2009: The Darkest Hour

These were all taken the night of November 1st. All of these props were left outside overnight while we received 2 to 3 inches of rain, and they held up pretty good for not being sealed or anything like that. I have some pictures from Halloween night that didn't come out nearly as good, I'll post some of those later. I am so glad I decided to leave the display up for one extra day so that I could get some decent pictures... I usually break it all down on Halloween night so that on the morning of November 1st, all appears to be back to normal.

Halloween on November 1st

I decided to leave my display up for one more night since the rain prevented me from getting any good pictures on Halloween night. So, we had Halloween again tonight. I even had a few people stop by and get out to look at all of it. The pictures I got tonight were much, much better, and I'll post some more soon!
This is what a prop looks like after being left out in about 2-3 inches of rain overnight by the way... not too bad, some of them had some minimal damage, nothing a little paint won't fix. I don't use any sealer or anything, and was surprised at how well they held up.

The missing are found...

This is the scarecrow lineup for Grim Hollow, 2009. This year's theme is "The Darkest Hour".

Straggler

Strain

Strawman


Stricken


Strife

More pictures to come...

The Lost

I read about this prop idea last year on Pumpkinrot's What's Brewing blog, and kind of had the idea stuck in head since then, so I had to build it. It's about 3'10" tall, and resembles a small child. I think I may put a few pieces of candy on the ground in front of it to make it appear that the child may have spilled them, or maybe put a couple of hands, fingers, etc. in its bucket. My hopes are that some concerned parent will lean down to help this child and realize that this is no ordinary kid. This doesn't really go with the rest of my setup this year, it's just something I had been wanting to build since I read about it.

Thanks, Rot, for this awesome prop idea.




Rot's Original Post

"Stricken" Preview

New Prop: Stricken

Grim Hollow Graveyard

Started setting up the graveyard today...

"Strain"

Preview of the latest prop for Grim Hollow 2009...

Strife

Strife Pics

Here are a few more pictures of my new Strife prop. I re-used the head and hands from the first groundbreaker corpse I ever attempted to build, which didn't turn out so hot. Actually, they are from this guy. The rest of it is made from a skeleton made from rolled up newspaper, which was covered in paper mache'. Most of the branches I used are from Mountain Laurel, which I have a ton of growing in the woods behind my house. I'm looking forward to building a few more of these this year to line each side of my driveway. Should be a pretty spooky walk for the kids to get their treats this year...

Strife Video

Sorry it took so long. Hope you like it...



More pictures to come.

Soon

I promise, more pictures will be coming soon... here's a hint.

Strife Preview

Putting the finishing touches on my new prop, "Strife". Couldn't wait to post a picture, so here is a little preview.

First 2009 prop in progress

I finally got around to starting my first prop today. I hope it will come out the way I am seeing it in my mind, I drew a sketch of what I wanted it to look like but it is already morphing into something completely different. It's a scarecrow type prop with a lot of influences from... who else... Pumpkinrot. I hope I am able to do his work some sort of justice with this prop, which is kind of borrowing several ideas from several different props. I don't think it will be too hard or take too long to complete, but I don't want to post any pictures until it is just right. Hopefully I'll have some up in about a week or so.

I keep wanting to use the word "Pumpkinrotish", maybe we can all get that one into the dictionary one of these days.

Finally

The creative juices are finally flowing, and I'm about to start working on some new props starting Friday. I've been sketching some ideas, and making plans for this years haunt as they come to me. I'll just say that it's going to be a lot darker this year, which will be fitting for the name I have come up with. I shot some video of last years haunt, but never got around to putting it together and posting it. I hope to make a video for that haunt, and make a really good one for this year too. I'm only about six months behind schedule, but still think I will be able to pull off good things. Our new baby will probably be arriving sometime around the middle of October, so the haunt is going to have to be sort of low maintenance this year, but I still think it is going to be the best one yet. It feels good to be excited again.