ULTIMATE HALLOWEEN PROPS - TWO WAY MIRRORS

If you have never used a two way mirror in your haunted house then you are definitely missing out. If you are looking for one of the coolest halloween props for your haunted house that can be reused year after year and won't cost a fortune a two way mirror is perfect. I purchased a two foot by two foot mirror from a haunted house supplier for about twenty five dollars. I framed it with some left over trim from a remodeling job on my living room. There are just too many ways to use a two way mirror in a haunted house. My personal favorite is to hang it in front of a wall in a hallway. If you don't make your walls out of black plastic or a material that you can cut and get behind this may not work. I try to find a spot with enough room for a person to stand behind the plastic. Cut out the plastic behind the mirror about two inches smaller on each side than the size of the mirror. Now tape the back of the mirror to the plastic with duct tape. I usually tape another piece of plastic or a large trash bag that is wider than the mirror on the back side of the wall. Now get a good flashlight and put on a mask or face of your choice and stand with your face right up to the back side of the mirror. Put the piece of plastic you just taped up over your head to keep the flashlight from lighting up anything else. Hold the flashlight up to your face and wait. When people walk by the mirror just turn on the flashlight and your face will suddenly appear in the mirror out of nowhere. This is an awesome trick because people generally tend to focus on mirrors, and a face appearing in a mirror is usually pretty scary. A good way to use this is to put the mirror at the beginning of a long hallway. Cut a slit in the wall just past the mirror. Leave the hallway pretty dark except for a bright strobe light hanging from the ceiling. Now adjust the strobe light to flash very slow, so that everyone seems to move in slow motion. Now when your victims walk past flip the flashlight on and scare the crap out of them. Once they pass the mirror bust out of the wall where you cut the slit and follow them down the hall brandishing a knife or weapon of your choice. The strobe light will disorient them and make your approach look very distorted. Trust me this will scare the hell out of everyone. This trick works best if you dress like a well known slasher from a horror flick. If you feel real adventurous you can just hang the mirror up and let it be a regular mirror if all else fails. Out of all of the Halloween Props that I have used over the years my two way mirror has been my favorite Prop. It was inexpensive, multi-functional and has lasted for years.

DO MOVIE MONSTERS MAKE EFFECTIVE HALLOWEEN PROPS?

For many years I tried to distance myself far away from using characters from horror films in my haunted houses. I wanted to come up with original characters in my haunt, to be different than everyone else. I thought that using movie characters wouldn't scare people. About three years ago I found out I was dead wrong. I decided to use a few guys from some classic horror flicks. A couple of my friends wanted to be Jason Voorhees and Michael Myers. I wasn't too thrilled with the idea at first, but I decided that I would give it a shot. They ended up being the highlight of the haunted house. I have used them every year since, I just find a new place to use them. This made me stop and rethink my whole style of haunting. I guess people can relate better to things they are familiar with. We see these characters in movies and they are scary, but to run into one of them in person. These were two very good characters because they don't speak. They just bust out of nowhere and come after you. People literally went into fits at the sight of them. If you can work these characters and things that people relate to you will have a haunt that will scare the crap out of people. Plus if you plan on running your haunt for several days at Halloween you can always change things if they aren't working, so don't be afraid to experiment.

FLYING HEAD PROPS ARE SIMPLE AND EFFECTIVE

If you are looking for something to add to an empty hallway, or a small narrow hallway I have the perfect prop for halloween. What I call the flying head prop is an ages old prop that is always effective. It consists of a head or large spider or whatever you choose that travels on a piece of fishing line. When your victims come down a dark hallway a head comes flying at them. It seems extremely simple, which it is but works everytime. I like to attach a small pulley at each end of the hallway. Then run you fishing line around both pulleys and tie the ends to create a continuous loop. This allows you to reel it back to the start point after each trip. Then I attach another piece of fishing line to the head and attach it to a stick or anything easy to hold onto. Try to run it high enough on the other end so that it won't get tangled on any of your victims. I like to build a false wall on the other end of the hallway so that someone can stand behind it and work the prop. I cut holes in my walls on both ends so that the head comes out of the wall travels down the hallway and disappears into the other hallway. A good way to enhance the effect is tie pieces of fishing line of different lengths to the head so that they hit your victims on it's way over their heads. Try to place the head high enough so that it won't hit anyone in the face. There are several ways to work off of this prop. You can cover the ceiling and walls with cobwebs and use a large spider instead of a head. Just be creative and use some imagination and this will be one of the simplest and most effective Halloween Props.

IT'S ALL ABOUT FRIGHT TACTICS!!!

The single greatest part of putting on a haunted house is the scare. To scare the living daylights out of someone is what you work toward from start to finish. I never tried to make money or become famous with my haunted houses, I only wanted to scare people. Adults, children, old and young I love to scare people. Let's pretend that there are two schools of thought when it comes to fright. The first one I call this frightful imagery. This method includes highly detailed scenes that focus on what frightens people, such as Clowns, monsters, characters from horror movies. I call these things a sort of slow fright, there isn't the shock factor involved. You simply expose people to things they are afraid of. For example, alot of people are afraid of clowns. You have a room that is brightly colored with balloons and streamers. The walls are painted some sort of circus theme. As your victims walk past a large jack in the box, a clown pops out of the box. You create the scene to set the mood, then you execute the scare with something that people are generally afraid of.
The second method which happens to be my personal favorite is the shock fest. This method relies on dark eerie scenes with lots of surprises. I have found that if a person doesn't see it coming then they will be even more scared. An example of this would be a dark crypt scene with a person busting out of a coffin. I try to put things in the room that will distract people or draw their attention somewhere else. This way when the real shocker happens they won't be expecting it. The shock effect can be enhanced with sound effects, lights and other props. I like to incorporate alot of darkness with low ceilings, mazes and trick walls. When victims enter a room that seems empty only to have a person in a mask tear out of the wall in a frenzy you get one hundred percent pure terror. I have had people run through the walls in my haunted house trying to get all because of these simple setups. Just about anything that jumps out of a dark corner at someone is guarenteed to scare them. Loud noises, chainsaws, strobe lights, trick walls, two way mirrors and caskets are just a few things to enhance your scare shockers. I have used this method the last three years because it is extremely cheap to build because there are no real elaborate scenes to build and decorate. I don't use animatronics of any kind. I call it going back to the basics, alot of darkness with twists and turns and lots of surprises.
In the past I was obsessed with detail. I loved to build these elaborate scenes with their own sound effects. They looked awesome but they just weren't that scary. I finally decided to focus more on being scary then being something cool to look at. I got some pretty good results with this method. I went from drawing a crowd of around four to five hundred people to drawing about a thousand people. Just remember that however you decide to scare people just stop and ask yourself if you would scare. If you think that you could scare yourself then you will probably effective.

OPEN FOR SUGGESTIONS!!!!!!

I strive to write about topics that people would care to know about, but you can't please everyone. If anyone has a question or a topic they would like to know about feel free to leave a comment or drop me an email. I will try to roll out an article as soon as possible.

Masks, Prosthetics or Makeup?

I have always strived to find a medium that looks good is comfortable and convenient. Back in the day you either wore a mask or makeup. My biggest problem with masks is finding one that looks good and fits right. Usually a mask will be too big, or the eyes holes will not be aligned with your eyes. Masks are also extremely hot to wear for long periods of time. You will also spend alot of money buying high quality masks. On the other hand a good mask will last you for many years, and they don't require any preparation time. You can just slip a mask on and off when you need to.
Makeup on the other hand requires some prep time to apply. Depending on the type of makeup you apply or how complex it could take several hours to get it all on. The hardest part with using makeup aside from time is keeping it from smearing or running off from sweat. If you do a good job makeup can be extremely effective and cheap. The best time to buy makeup is right after halloween. I usually go to Walmart after halloween and buy it on clearance. You can usually find everything for a dollar or less. My favorite is always going to be Latex Prosthetic apllications. The application just glues to your face with adhesive. The neat thing with latex prosthetics is they bend with you facial expressions. You have full freedom to move you mouth and face. I have been using prosthetics for about four years now. They look like part of your face when applied right. They are fairly cheap and can be applied in about twenty minutes time. You can purchase them from several sites on the internet. If you can find one that suits your needs you can buy all of the components seperate such as noses, ears chins and scars. I highly recommend every one to try them. Whichever method you choose just remember to pick the one that looks best and fits within your budget.

GET THE MOST OUT OF YOUR HALLOWEEN PROPS WITH CHEAP LIGHTING

How you light your haunted house is one of the most important factors in successful haunting. I put just about as much time and effort into my lighting than anything else. Whether you want bright elaborate scenes or dark dreary rooms, lighting is the key to setting atmosphere. Black Lights are probably the most widely used lights in haunted houses. They provide adequate light but not too much light, plus they make everything look extremely cool. I usually buy the twelve or twenty-four inch blacklights. They are fairly cheap and the bulbs can be replaced when they go bad. I have some black lights that have been in use for several years. Strobe lights are a good source of light for your haunted house if you want to shock or disorient people. Strobe lights are not that expensive but they will have to be replaced more often. The good thing about strobe lights is that you can adjust the speed of the flash to create slow motion or very fast to disorient people. One of my favorite sources of light would have to be flicker bulbs. The flicker bulbs that most haunted house suppliers sale can be expensive. I found a craft supply store on the internet that sold them for about two dollars a piece. I also found some cheap light sockets with six foot cords for about a dollar a piece. These are awesome in chandaliers and candle holders. They produce a flicker that looks like a candle flame and they put off very little light. Flicker bulbs can be used just about anywhere in any lighting. If you want to create a very eerie atmosphere in your haunt try some flicker bulbs. As always be creative with your lighting. I like to place black lights on the ceiling facing the direction that people will travel. That way the lights are out of direct view of your guests. Strobe lights will work best if they are triggered once people are right under them, so that you get the surprise factor. I like to use slow flashing strobe lights to make people look like they are moving in slow motion. I once had a long hallway where I had a face appear in a two way mirror. As soon as my guests passed the mirror the actor came through the wall and followed the guest out of my haunt. The slow flashing strobe light made it extremely scary. I can't even explain the effectiveness that the strobe light created. Lighting isn't there just so people can see the way to go. If lighting is used properly you can't create a whole different effect.

BUILDING YOUR OWN HALLOWEEN PROPS

The key to building a haunted house on a small budget is to use your imagination. Once you have a good idea about what you want to do in your haunt just look around you. See what you have lying around you that can be transformed into an awesome halloween prop. Old fruniture, Cardboard Boxes, Styrofoam or even old clothes can be used to make good halloween props. I live in a rural area, and people like to dump their junk beside roads or other places. I have found some of my best props in these dumps. Any item that you can dress up with some paint or cheese cloth can be useful. Best of all is the fact that these items are free. There are lots of people out there who will give you scrap wood or other materials that can be used. Don't look at something and think where will this fit, but what you can make it in to. I was building an electric chair a few years back and had everything but the top that fits over the persons head. I dug around and found an old enamel bowl and painted it silver, tapped a hole in bottom fastened it with a coat hanger. Then I touched it up with some colored electrical wires and it looked good considering what I used on it. It always pays to keep the necessities on hand. Spray Paint, black plastic, cheese cloth, spray foam insulation, chicken wire and cardboard are some things that are good to use on props. Most of these materials are very inexpensive, and can be reused. I like things that are reusable, like black plastic. I use black plastic for all of my walls and ceilings. The neat thing about black plastic is that after halloween you just roll it up and put it away till next year. Corpses can be made easily out of chicken wire and burlap cloth. Make a frame out of PVC pipe or scrap wood, then use chicken wire to build a body and cover the wire with old cloth or burlap. You can usually find some type of cheap burlap cloth at walmart. Then just paint or stain the cloth a dirty looking color, add a skull or head of choice and you have a corpse. Prop building becomes an art form in it's own. Props are usually very expensive to buy, you could spend several hundred or even thousands of dollars on a few good props. I will buy props if I run across something neat or something cheap, but I enjoy building my own above all else. Just remember when you build your haunt think about what you can create with what you have lying around, you will be surprised at the halloween props you can build with the stuff you already have.