It has been ages since I last posted. I wont get in to the reasons for it right now. Lately I have been working on a project for next years Halloween fun.

A few years ago I built a “Lightning Box” based upon a color organ circuit, and a halogen flood light. The unit works, but is a bit clunky, and relies upon an external CD player boom box unit I bought at the Dollar store for $5. The whole contraption definitely could use some re-working.

The current plan is to make the unit fully self contained (with the exception of the speakers) and solid state. The C player will be replaced with a audio player circuit I located that is based upon the ATTINY85 processor. I also plan to remove the amplifier board from a set of old computer speakers, combine that board with the audio player, and then feed the amplified audio into the color organ as well as the speakers. This entire collection of hardware should be able to be housed in a standard Carlon 4x4x4 PVC watertight junction box. More on that later…

I have attached a picture of the working prototype Audio board.

Pictures are up, you can see them all in my gallery, some of you might recognize a few people…

Skeleton Chat

Here is one of the more fun shots of the kids all having a conversation with my skeleton puppet. I can see from the pictures, that I do have some work to do on rounding out his shoulders, and making his neck look better. Over all most of the interactions were nice, I scared a few kids, had interesting conversations with a few others. Gave educational advice… Really… If you are taking advice on education from a 9 ft skeleton, you might want to see a licensed therapist. Sadly, like every year there were one or two interactions that broke bad. The worst of all was the 12-14 year old punk that thought it would be funny to jump on my back. The skeleton puppet is basically an aluminum framework built into a backpack. All told, when clothed, it weighs around 50 pounds. I wear this for nearly 5 hours straight. So a 150 pound kid jumping on my back 3 hours into the night is NOT a welcome addition. Sadly, he did this after sneaking up on me… And as a result I bellowed “GET OFF!!!”, thrashed, and then instinctively donkey kicked him about 2 feet behind me into a tree… “Oh my god! He kicked me! He Actually Kicked me!!!”, he moaned as he limped away. I turned to him, and told him to get off the property, and don’t come back. “…And next time you might want to think before sneaking up on someone and jumping on them!” His friends, of course, started taunting me, to which I went into my full outside voice, (I’m actually amped in the puppet so the voice comes from the head and not from the chest) magnified by the amp, shouted “GET OUT OF HERE!!!!” and charged them at a full run. They screamed, ran and didn’t stop running until the next block. Hopefully they ended up with some laundry to do…

My favorite comment of the night came from two women parked in an SUV across the street enjoying the show, “I’m 82 and shes 56, and we are not to old for Tick-Or-Treating!”

Zack and Christopher

I had a lot of great helpers this year, my usual two co-workers, Zack, and Christopher got here very early, and helped with the setup, which was a godsend. The Gardner family, and also arrived a few hours early to help out with the final setup. All of the reliable help made it possible to actually have everything done, and working with time enough to eat and get dressed before the start of Trick-Or-Treating. The extra help made tear down go lighting fast. It was incredible to have such a great team and I consider myself very lucky.

Thank you again to everyone who helped out, showed up to watch, said kind words, or just stared in awe at the sheer spectacle of the event.

To say thank you, seems such an underpowered statement, but Thank You!!!  Christopher, Zack, Laura, Jeremy, Emily, Luke, Steve, Scott, and of course my mother.

Zombie!

I could not have pulled off such a wonderful night without you all!  I am eternally grateful for all of your help, professional behavior, and your willingness to put up with some of my more eccentric behaviors and requests.

We had 339 kids, and 5 dogs that made it to the porch this year, shy of last years total by 9 kids.  Never the less we put on one incredible show and I could not have done it without all of your help.

What are you all doing next Halloween?

Laura and her camera were everywhere taking WONDERFUL shots of the action, which I will post soon, Jeremy took video for me which I will look over and post some of that when I get the chance, and Scott also took a bunch of pictures and once I get them I will post them as well.

A few months back I posted a picture of a strange looking box. I also asked people to guess what the box did. There were some good guess, but none that hit it 100%.

The box, contained a programmable micro controller board. It also contained a small circuit to interface with the “Try Me” button for an off the shelf Gargoyle I bought at Walgreens.

The box, combined with the gargoyle, some home brew LED spotlights, a hacked Dance Dance Revolution Mat, a plaster pedestal I painted to look like marble, and a nice alcove in a set of our bushes, creates my latest scene for Halloween.

The visitor walks past a set of bushes, when suddenly the alcove lights up, showing a gargoyle, the gargoyle opens his eyes, and begins to speak. When he is finished, he closes his eyes again, and the lights dim.

Just imagine the fun this will cause.

Today, I finished creating the Prop-1 to RC controller interface circuit. The schematic, for ExpressSCH is available here.

Interface Schematic

It works like a charm, all simple transistor logic, no relays, no nothing. Now, with a simple 3 lines of code in the Prop-1 program I can remotely trigger a prop ~30 feet away.


HIGH Bkwd
PAUSE 300
LOW Bkwd

Completed circuit

One cool thing of note, I submitted the schematic to the support forum for the Prop-1. The head programmer / developer gave it his ok, and complimented me on part of the design.

Well, I couldn’t stop at just the crow, and the flying ghoul. I found in my bins of stuff a screaming head I got from Target a few years ago. I never did set it out anywhere, but I took a look at it, and found it was indeed quite hackable. I dropped in the receiver board from another of the remote control cars. This time though, I had already used the Forward,and Reverse signals for other props, so had to do a little hacking to the receiver. Fortunately the chip in the car is capable of five separate actions, and the chipset is documented on the net, so I used one of the unused channels and linked it into the head. I then had to build a remote that had buttons for all five signals. I built that, finished the interfacing of the receiver and now have the ability to trigger the head from a remote. Tomorrow morning I’ll build a second transmitter for the Prop-1 to use to transmit.

Ok, so really it’s not a raven, it’s a crow…

A few years ago, when I got my first Prop-1 controller form EFX-TEK I set it up to control my popup jumper, and my squawking crow. Initially, the only way I could come up with a way to set off the crow was to insert a relay inline with the “try me” button on its bottom. This worked fine, except that it had the distinct disadvantage of requiring a cable leading from the crow to the controller. Later After I had that all working, I purchased a ghoul that “flew” down a rope and back. It too had a poor activation method, that I wanted to bypass. This time, due to the nature of the prop, I could NOT use any wired connection. This meant wireless. I looked online for some wireless transmitters and receivers, and found them to be cost prohibitive. This annoyed me greatly, until I was browsing the clearance isle at Wal-Mart and found a radio controlled car for $1. At that, an idea was born. I quickly snatched up the car, and dismantled it in the parking lot. I looked over the circuits to find they looked very simple, and easily modifiable. So I drove to radio shack, picked up a few parts and when I got home wired a buzzer up in place of one of the motors, and glued the receiver, and a separate power pack under the gouls cloak, and sure enough, when i pressed a button on the remote, the ghoul would hear the buzzer and start moving. I wasn’t thinking then, as I shoudl have went back and picked up 4 more of the RC cars to allow me to control up to 5 items (forward, reverse, left, right, turbo) from the one controller.
Flash forward to today, I recently went to the dollar store and picked up 5 cheap RC cars, all to my luck, having very tiny receiver boards. This morning, I sat down with the receiver board, and using my limited knowledge of electronics, wired it directly into my crows control circuitry. Now, the crow still functions as it did out of the box, but also sports a fully internal radio receiver. With the press of a button on the remote, or once I’m done, a signal from the micro-controller running the show, the crow will activate. Best part, there are NO wires, I can put the crow anywhere within a 15 ft radius of the transmitter and still have him work just fine. This should, in theory, also allow me to carry a controller with me where I can trigger him, and other props at will. MUAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAH

It is said, a friend will help you kill someone, but a real friend will help you bury the body.

Karl entrenched

Well, qualifies as a real friend. (Not that that was ever in doubt) Ok so there wasn’t actually a body, but I know very few people that would drive out here to help me dig a two foot deep trench, (26 to 28 inches in some places) to help me bury conduit to repair my yard light.

Eighteen years ago while planting a rose bush for my mother, I accidentally cut through the direct burial cable that ran to our yard light. This of course sucked badly, fortunately I was extremely lucky and was not harmed. So, with nothing more than a shoestring budget, I set out to repair the light. I made quite a few mistakes, but the end result had the wiring in conduit, and a little safer. It lasted for quite a few years. The past two years I started having trouble with it tripping the ground fault interrupter a lot, and I decided that I would need to replace it all again. Now that I have a full time job, and have paid off all my credit card debt, I could afford to do it right.

Burying Karl

Today, at around 11:00, Karl arrived to find me digging the beginnings of the new trench for the conduit. After a few shovel fulls of dirt the larger shovel split its handle out, so we ran to go buy some better shovels for the job. After returning we trenched, by hand, a 30 foot long trench that ranged from 26″ to 28″ inches deep and ran from my house to the yard light. It took us a while, but we did it, and I am glad that the conduit is now the recommended dept. Previously when I did it myself at age 14, I was a lazy bum and the “trench” was no more than 6 inches below ground… I knew that was too shallow, but at 14, I didn’t care. Once the trench was dug, we set about laying the conduit. As we did I discovered, the outdoor outlet post I had purchased had an added surprise. It could be configured, through the use of an insert into a dual purpose, high and low voltage post. I couldn’t resist this opportunity so while I set about cleaning up the underground knock out hole in the lamp post Karl headed off to get more conduit so I could have a separate run of conduit for low voltage items, such as speaker wire, video, or data. Just imagine the possibilities if what I could do if my yard is wired for sound… MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA be afraid, be very afraid…

By the time Karl returned, I had ran the wire for the lamp post to the outlet post, and while he assembled the low voltage conduit run, I ran the wire from the outlet post back to the house. Once that was done, and all of the connections were made, we tested the circuit, and everything checked out. It’s important to note, that Karl changed the blown light bulb for me, the real reason the light was not working the past month… (Ok, simplest solution, I know….)

Now though, I feel 100% safe in the knowledge that the wiring to the yard, that I rely on heavily for Halloween, and Christmas displays is now safe, and water tight. Thank you Karl, Thank you Ladies at Ace Hardware who must have thought we were nuts… Oh, and thank you neighbors, who stopped to ask if I was working on my Halloween display… MUAHAHAHAH… Ya know… I should have ran a 3rd conduit while we were at it… one for Pneumatics… Oh well, next time… Hey Karl, what are you doing tomorrow?

What do you get when you combine 24 awg stranded 2 conductor wire with a resistor, and a high intensity L.E.D.?

You get a really awesome spotlight so small that it can be easily hidden in even the smallest tree beach and yet illuminate a scene plenty bright enought.

Tonight, I wired 5 of these. 2 blue, 2green, and 1 red. Tomorrow I hope to make the housing for them.

Tonight I spent the night cramming wires, a circuit board, and other components into and on top of a little black box. In theory once I go through one other step and then attach a few wires I should have something really cool. At least that’s the hypothesis anyway. I’ll post a picture tomorrow and let people guess what it is. Muahahaha!

Ok gang, you asked for it. Here are the photos I managed to snap, not great but they will have to do. The 1st page or two are of pre-halloween prep. Jump in to page 2 for the stuff taken on Halloween itself.
Some of my personal favorites as the following shots:
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It’s the big night.
A huge thank you to Stacia, Christopher, and Zack all their help. We had good weather, good weather is usually both a blessing ad a curse. When there is good weather, more people tend to travel other places it seems. When we have bad weather, or a threat of bad weather, we get a larger turn out. It’s weird.
The new talking skull, and monster in a bush were hits. The giant skeleton puppet is always a huge success, and had many return visitors. I had to pose for tons of pictures and had conversation with a number of kids. I still cant get over all the kids that stare up to theskulls head, and hold up their candy buckets to show the skeleton their haul.

Humanoid Trick or Treaters: 348
Canine Trick or Treaters: 5

Yes we do give out dog treats to the dogs that come too. We even had one show up that remembered it from last year, last year he was very skittish about approaching the house, this year he happily took the treat and guarded it. The owner laughed heartily, and said “Oh he remembers you from last year when he got a treat so we had to come back”

I also got growled at by a wiener dog named Odie who was protecting his family from the big giant skeleton. After a minor correction he was content to let me continue talking to them.

Tomorrow: Pack things back up and put them away for another year.

I recently bought a new prop from Menards. It’s marketed as a “Haunted Hedge”. It consists of a set of light up eyes, and a separate box that contains a motor with a wobble weight on it. When the prop is triggered it shakes the bush you place it in, moans, and lights the eyes. Out of the box the prop is supposed to be triggered by sound. Frankly I find the sound triggers unreliable, and in addition, there is never a re-trigger delay built in. This means, as soon as the prop is done making noise, it can be re-triggered by more noise. This makes it really easy for kids to stay in one spot triggering, and re-triggering the prop. The “Haunted Hedge” like so many halloween props out there, comes with a “Try Me” button. Hold the button down and the prop runs. This makes for an interesting way to interface to the prop with my own controls. Read on for my solution.
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So, while trying to recover today I was bored… So I managed to finish the look of the skull. Hot glue, moss, and a little stain and wow!

Oh and since last I posted, I painted the pedestal using Juli’s techniques.

Thanks very much to . I now have four fully stoned tombstones. Opinions?
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Today I was able to make a lot of progress on the new props for Halloween. I managed to carve 2 more tombstones, and make some serious progress on the Talking Skull. The tombstones, except for one more, are all carved and their fronts are painted. I have attached the wood I will use to mount the stakes using Liquid Nails adhesive. Tomorrow night I hope to paint the back sides of all of the tombstones, then later in the week is going to help me make them look like stone.
The talking skull prop made a quantum leap today, thanks to a shopping trip last night with my lady. I have been struggling with what I was going to mount the skull on. Last night while at Target, we found a Halloween urn. I saw it, and knew I had to have it, it was perfect. Once I had it I knew I needed a platform to go in it to attach the skull. I made a trip to the hardware store, and forced my brain to reject things for what they were designed for and to look at them as “legos” so to speak. I knew I needed something able to support the weight of the skull, and yet be made of a material I could work with. I decided PVC would be the best bet, and wandered the plumbing isle. I found a flush mount toilet flange, and knew I had exactly what i needed. I stopped in the paint area picked up some mis-tint paint in the approximate shades of grey I needed. When I got home, I checked the flange in the urn and it was an exact fit. I drilled a hole in the center, mounted the skull and knew I had what i needed. I then disassembled it and gave the flange a good coating of black paint.
Later I drilled a couple holes through the urn into the flange to allow for 2 screws to hold it securely in place, and then attached some LEDs for up lighting. It’s really coming along.

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Ok, perhaps a bit morbid of a title.. but oh well, I’m feeling kinda morbid.
I give you Dentist Brown.

Stranger tread
This ground with gravity.
Dentist Brown
Is filling his last cavity.

I just wanted to post this picture, before I went back to bed… Long weekend.. I’m still exhausted… but this is the progress on the tombstones…

Opinons?

I need some names for my tombstones. I found some epitaphs I like, a couple have names in them, but I need names for the others… I like humorous names to go with the epitaphs.
For example I’m using, “M. T. SUIT” for the following
Lived a life of stress and worry
Rushing through it in a hurry
Didn’t stop to smell the roses
But now he feeds them as he decomposes

Make your suggestions by comment please.
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I have started work on a new batch of tombstones for the Halloween display this year.

They are made from building insulation foam. I broke down and bought a foam cutter from Hobby Lobby for $20, and am GLAD I did. I have a few others to cut, then I will set about gluing the supports to the backs, and then painting.

The cross design, is based off one I saw on the web. I was going to try to freehand it, but couldn’t get it to look right. So I sat down with my graphics program, and realized what I wanted was just a series of circles that were cut at various points. About 3 minutes later I had a pattern printed, traced to cardboard and cut out. Then it was just a matter of flipping and/or rotating the pattern 90 degrees to make the full design.