Walpurgisnacht

Walpurgisnacht. Witches Night.

Tonight, we revel around bonfires and fly to the Brocken mountaintop by broomstick. Engage in unholy pagan ritual as we celebrate the spring equinox...

Closer to home, we revel in this day as the midpoint to the high holiday of All Hallow's Eve.

In honor of this special day, I have brought back an old piece that I originally created back in 2017, with a new refresh. A quick, free form piece to celebrate the countdown to the big night. Halloween. It inches ever so closer...

  

Epic.

I feel like this logo deserves its own synthwave soundtrack. Create your own epic version here.

  

Highbury Cemetery Logo, 2017

With October starting on a Sunday this year, I had to bump this reveal back a day in order to get my first Cemetery Sundays post out.

But Monday is here and the October party has started!

With this year's logo, I decided to go a bit more minimal compared to the past couple of years, focusing on the shape of an old toe pincher coffin (which will be playing a big part in this year's haunt display). I also wanted to give it a more organic feel, a concept that will also be carried though on this year's haunt display.

Ladies and gentlemonsters, boils and ghouls, I present the super spooky 2017 edition of the Highbury Cemetery yard haunt logo...  

As in previous years, the logo will be used in t-shirts, posters and stickers. All of which will be given to my Halloween night helpers as a thank you gift. I also hope to make some pins for this season, but I'll reveal more on that later.

This October party is in full swing, so let's enjoy it! Frankenstein is on TCM tonight, the pumpkin beers in my fridge are cold and ready, and I'm already buzzing with the season's excitement. Only 30 more days to go!! Who's ready!?!?

  

100 Days - Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series No. 6

A quick glance at the calendar and I realize that it has caught me by surprise yet again. 

100 days until Halloween. Dammit.

Why not whip up the next image in the Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series, and then get out into the sweltering heat of the late July night and get some new Halloween props done??

Good idea...

Lots of new posts coming, I swear... The project list is written out (again), and now it's time to start crossing some things off. Time to get to it.

  

Walpurgisnacht (Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series No. 5)

Walpurgisnacht. Witches Night.

Tonight, we revel around bonfires and fly to the Brocken mountaintop by broomstick. Engage in unholy pagan ritual as we celebrate the spring equinox...

Closer to home, we revel in this day as the midpoint to the high holiday of All Hallow's Eve.

In honor of this special day, I have created another collage design for the Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series. A quick, free form piece to celebrate the countdown to the big night. Halloween. It inches ever so closer...

  

Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series No. 4

The creativity continues to flow and I was able to whip up another collage image for my continuing Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series. This time around, I threw on my new copy of The Thing soundtrack from Waxwork Records and let the sounds influence the spontaneous image assemblage below.

This series continues to be a simple exercise in free form creativity. It has no specific intent other than to serve as a fun outlet to keep my haunt-related ideas sharp as I head into this year's Halloween planning phase.

Feel free to check out the first three images in the series here, here and here.

 

Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series No. 3

I had some free time this past weekend and was able to whip up another image in my continuing Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series. It's great to sit down, listen to some haunt-inspiring music and then just let the creativity flow. Grab an image of one of my Halloween props (which so far have all been skull and corpse heads) and then just put together a spontaneous art piece. No specific purpose other than to exercise some creativity...

This time around, I listened to USURPER's killer dark ambient track, Death Dimension, from the release The Disappointment's Room. It had a minimal, dark and very foreboding sense of dread that really influenced this particular piece...

  Be sure to check out the first and second images in the series, as well as read the art's intent here.

  

Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series No. 2

The creativity keeps flowing and I was able to knock out the second image in the Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series. No specific purpose outside of a way to generate a spontaneous spurt of creativity during the off-season, and a new way to highlight some of the Halloween prop work that I have created over the past couple of years.

Last night, I threw Douglas Pipes' soundtrack to Trick 'r Treat on the turntable, sat down at the computer and finished this:

You can check out the first image (and read about the art's intent) in the Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series here.

  

Highbury Cemetery Graphic Series No. 1

I had a spurt of creative energy today, so I decided to sit down and make something. I put my Halloween soundtrack on the turntable, sat down at my computer and threw this together:

 

A fun little Photoshop graphic with no real specific purpose, it's a quick collage of a Highbury Cemetery prop image, coupled with various grunge clip art pieces and the Highbury Cemetery text "logo." I just spontaneously threw the elements together, making a few adjustments here and there, and then called it done. 

This was a great brain exercise for me today, just letting the creativity flow. I have a few more ideas and color palettes floating around in my head and hope to sit down and knock a few more of these fun graphics out soon. This new series will serve as a nice change of pace from the usual process of Halloween prop creation, and should ultimately help in the conceptualization of the larger projects planned for this October.

  

The Countdown Begins - 2012 Poster

Dusk settles early as a bloated, pale yellow moon reaches to the sky. A brisk breeze wisps through withering, golden foliage. A lone leaf breaks from its perch and falls silent and lifeless to the cold, receding earth below. Change is among us...

And thus, we begin anew. The season has transformed and October is upon us. Welcome to Highbury Cemetery's third annual kickoff to the Countdown to Halloween. The final run-in towards the magical holiday for spooks, spectres, ghouls and goblins. 31 posts in 31 days, all in anticipation of All Hallow's Eve!

We can't wait to get the daily posts flowing, counting down the nights until the arrival of the trick-or-treating hordes, braving their fears to enter our haunted grounds. Be sure to stop back daily as we dig deep to bring you anything and everything Halloween, from new home haunt props and how-tos to photos from seasons past and even some freebies for all of our faithful followers and friends.

So sit back, grab a cold beverage and enjoy the journey with us! And stop by the Countdown to Halloween. They have an enormous list of fellow bloggers who are coming along for the ride!



To kick things off, I'd like to take the wraps off of this year's poster. It's a little something I put together every year, and the design will be used for our annual t-shirt (among other things!), which is given out on Halloween night as a thank you to everyone who helps put Highbury Cemetery on. Because without them, we couldn't do what we do. Year number nine, and there is no sign of stopping!

A big thanks to Chad Savage and Gary Pullin, as I used their free font Ghoulish in this year's art. Chad has a slew of great Halloween-themed free fonts at his site here.