This one kinda got lost in all the madness leading up to Halloween night, but I still wanted to share it with everyone! As has been the case every Halloween here at Highbury Cemetery, I silkscreen custom shirts down in my basement for friends and family that come over and help out on the big night. I always start the October countdown with the revealing of the new haunt logo. I then take the logo and create a simple, one-color version for use on our shirts. I burn a silk screen with the logo down in the basement and print off a few shirts to give away as a thank you on the big night. This year, I went a little crazy and decided to print two versions of the shirt!!
The Brown Shirt I had a stack of brown shirts left over from last year's shirt run and decided to print them up with a standard white ink.
These shirts were given away to friends who live elsewhere or who couldn't make it over for the big night. I'm really happy with the way these shirts turned out. The details held throughout the run and I have a few left over that will be staying in the permanent collection at the Cemetery. Unless you ask REALLY nicely... The Purple Shirt This one was the limited version that was only given out to those that helped out with this year's haunt. Each of them earned it with the amount of work they contributed to make the show the success that it was. Without them, Highbury Cemetery wouldn't be what it is today.
This version was extra special and revealed a little surprise for each recipient when they got home...
Glow-in-the-dark ink! I was SOOOO happy with the way these shirts turned out. I ended up having to buy a new container of glow-in-the-dark ink (due to the fact that my old container looked more like tapioca pudding than ink when I opened it), but it made a huge difference. These shirts printed out really crisp and detailed and looked totally awesome in the dark. A worthy thank you for all the hard working friends and family on Halloween night!! Each of them earned it.
From the pitch black darkness, I was jolted awake from the sound of the alarm clock buzzing in the other room. It was my son's clock. That meant that it was 6:30 am. Strange, because I distinctly remember setting my own alarm for 5:30 am, just before completely passing out from total exhaustion. That was about 11:45 last night... As I tried to pull myself out of bed, I groaned from deep aches and pains that ran the entire length of my body. The middle of my back was one giant, twisted knot. My lower back felt like two dried skeletal bones painfully grinding together. My knee had been tweaked somewhere along the line, and was now swollen tight and stiff. My heel felt like a sharp concrete block that I could barely put pressure on. I literally felt like I had been run over by a dump truck. But still I was grinning from ear to ear. As I sat and reflected on the whirlwind events from the previous night, the grin began to glow and an excited buzz began to course through my veins. Last night's Halloween trick-or-treat celebration was awesome. Absolutely awesome. And that growing buzz helped dull the deep aches and pains from the previous day's long and heavy workload. Our depleted crew of three began our annual Halloween yard haunt setup at 9:00 am. It was a razor sharp battle between schedule and clock. Our goal? Everything and everyone had to be in place and ready to go by 6:00 pm. That gave us just 9 hours to get it all done. Sound crazy? I knew we had a lot of time, but we would still need to be incredibly efficient to get it all done. Especially working as a team of only three. And without an extensive and detailed setup plan, we never would have made it. Somehow, some way, everything was up and running at 5:57. All props, all lighting, all audio, all electrical. Everything. I had to stop and take it all in for a brief moment. A testament to our dedicated work and a finely detailed plan to get it all done. I took one deep breath. Exhaled. And then raced into the house. I had roughly 5 minutes to get my makeup done... I threw in some colored contact lenses, whipped up a few grungy streaks and colors across my face, and haphazardly assembled a costume out of pieces of my MHC Masquerade Ball costumes from the past three years. And I stepped out into the haunt at roughly 6:10, ready to greet the oncoming hordes of trick-or-treaters racing to our crypt door. And the trick-or-treaters kept coming. And coming. And coming. It was a relentless onslaught of kids, parents, friends and curious neighbors all night long. At times, it was impossible to count all the people coming and going through the cemetery arch. But they kept coming. The two hours of trick-or-treat flew by, but each of us, now numbering 11 total actors and helpers, had an incredibly fun time. And the weather was absolutely perfect. The nighttime air was dry, but perfectly chilly and crisp. The clouds thinned, revealing the murky glow of a near-full moon. The wind even died down, allowing for some of the thickest plumes of fog I have ever seen in my many years of displays. The final trick-or-treaters left at about 8:30 pm, and I quickly grabbed my camera, wildly snapping photos throughout the display. And by 9:00, it was time for the evening's crescendo: the tear down. 11 individuals working together to get it all taken down and put away, leaving no trace of the events that had taken place just an hour earlier. The magic of the day's events was now complete. Setup of the display, an amazing haunt visual and auditory show, then a complete tear down, returning to the stark plainness of an unlit, empty yard. But the best part of the evening sat in a coffin at the top of the driveway. All night long, people brought donations to our first annual Halloween canned food drive. The coffin was nearly filled to the top by the end of the night. When I went to see how much we had collected, I was beside myself in shock. Neighbors and friends had really stepped up and filled the coffin for a cause! It was the perfect ending for an absolutely perfect night...
After everything had been stashed away and the annual thank you t-shirts had been given out, I limped up the stairs to upload all of the evening's photos. I was very happy with what I was able to capture! I'm currently going through and picking the best of the best to present here and across the interwebs. I'm incredibly proud of what the team was able to accomplish last night and incredibly humbled by the outpouring of support from the rest of the neighborhood. Check back tomorrow night for a full gallery of Highbury Cemetery 2017 shots and a detailed review of the evening's events.
Another October is coming to a close, but the big show is yet to begin! I wanted to take a quick second to thank everyone who stopped by, hung out and dropped comments into my stream of Countdown to Halloween posts all month long. This really is the best time of the year and I'm so stoked to be able to share it with you all! This will be my final post for October, as I have a TON of work to do today to get the display up and ready to go for tonight's trick-or-treat. For anyone curious about what it is we do and would like to check it out in person, we're located at 536 Malvern Road in Akron. We're around the corner from King School. But be sure to stop by between 6 and 8 pm, because once the show is over, everything disappears in a flash. And don't forget to bring some canned food for our first annual canned food drive for the Akron-Canton Regional Foodbank! Drop a donation into the "Coffin for a Cause" and receive an extra special treat! Time to go put up an entire yard haunt display. Everyone have an absolutely amazing Halloween night!! Especially you east coast haunters. Hopefully you guys can all recover from the wind and storm damage and have a killer show! Check back in a day or two and I'll have tons of photos from the big night! Happy Halloween, everyone!!
I've always kinda hated that song, but the title is very fitting. Revision after revision, I had the final list of projects for the Halloween display. One by one, I went down the list, checking off each task. The jack-o-lanterns were carved. The lights were all set, along with a bin full of extension cords. The props were staged, ready to be placed in the yard with lightning quick precision.
As I continued to whip through my list, I kept seeing that one last project: fix the animated shiatsu massager ground breaker. It's a prop that I have always loved, but also hated due to the finicky nature of it working and not working.
By the time I decided to go for it, it was already getting late. At this point of the night, I was already contemplating shelving the whole thing for another year. But I still ended up pulling it out, at least to assess the amount of work needed to fix it. I remembered that the arm had broken off the last time it was used in my display.
As I pulled it apart, the extent of damage was quickly evident. The entire "rotating nub" of the massager itself had broken off. Not good. It would require more work and time than I had originally planned for, but I decided to see what I could do.
After running through different ideas of replacement bolt nubs or even gluing, I realized that there was a different fix. I had a second shiatsu massager sitting in a corner. What transpired next was a blur of disassembly and reassembly that would make Dr. Frankenstein proud.
I was able to swap out the entire massager unit, make a few arm piece length adjustments, and then rig up two straps to hold the neck and arm PVC pipe pieces in place without clunking into each other. All told, the entire switch took and hour and 15 minutes. I plugged the new massager in and hit the button. The zombie sprung to life as the head twisted side to side and the arm swung wildly back and forth. I sat on the basement steps, watching in amazement as the prop continued to work flawlessly.
As I sat and marveled at my work, I realized that I was not yet done for the evening. I turned the prop off and headed back upstairs.
The clock already read 11:00, but I had a certain tradition to continue.
I sat my weary body down on the couch and fired up the Blu Ray player...
After my annual Halloween Eve viewing of Trick 'r Treat, I pulled my body into bed to catch a few hours of sleep before having to get up early and get the big show started. It's always a ton of work, but it's always worth it!
It's amazing that as haunters we can somehow control the weather for Halloween night. Truth be told, I still start checking the forecast two weeks ahead, knowing full well that the forecast will change another 50 times. And I still secretly pray to the Candy Corn Gods for a favorable forecast for the big night.
The weather is the one thing that can really make or break a haunter's yard display. And I also know that not everyone will have favorable weather on the big night. I'm already hearing horror stories about a storm packing fierce winds traveling up the east coast. My shriveled, rotted heart goes out to those haunters.
But as I make a final check of my own forecast, it looks as though my prayers and sacrifices have appeased the Candy Corn Gods! And for this, I am eternally grateful!
It's strange to see a chance of showers pop up today after initially being forecast for no rain for at least the last week. But I'll take a chance of rain today in exchange for my Halloween forecast. Dry and chilly, exactly as I had hoped!
And the Candy Corn Gods have given me great favor this Halloween season: two separate forecasts with a ZERO PERCENT chance of precipitation. Thank you, O Mighty Candy Corn Gods! You are most benevolent!!
We're getting down to the final hours of prep time until the big night! Still so much to do, but all of my cemetery audio has been loaded and is ready to spread some dread throughout the display!
I've decided to use Jeff Greinke's incredible 1992 dark ambient audio track, "The Moor" again for my my main audio track. I have used it for the past 3 or 4 years now, but I keep coming back to it. It really is a perfect track to use. The ominous ambient sounds perfectly blanket the cemetery scene, staying in the background and supporting the display. It helps build an atmosphere of fright and unease as the trick-or-treaters brave a walk through the ghastly cemetery and into a cold, dark crypt to receive their reward!
A cold, weathered hand pierces the rust-laden earth of a late autumn night. Reanimated decay becomes the evening's guide. Masked faces bask in the fiery glow of a jack-o-lantern's illumination. A lifeless finger points the direction toward the next porch-lit house. For this is the night of ghouls and goblins and tricks and treats. This is the night of Hallowe'en...
