My Neglected Blog OR Baby's First Christmas

Greetings all! Remember me? :-)
Well, I should have known this would happen.
As much of a Halloween nut as I am January through November, once Thanksgiving dinner is over I tend to go into hardcore Christmas mode. Plus, it's V's first Christmas and she's approaching 5 months so she is really becoming a trip to be around!
Anyway, I know I'll be useless to Halloween until after Christmas so I wanted to stop by and wish everyone Happy Holidays. A thanks to the ever vigilant Pumpkinrot for keeping me in daily doses of Halloween goodness and a HAPPY BIRTHDAY shoutout to SpookyBlue!

If you want some sickeningly sweet Christmas/Baby stuff visit me at my other place.
Cheers!

It's A Great Pumpkin Christmas

Pumpkinhead scarecrow watches over the Christmas tree decorating.

R.I.P. Uncle Forry

Seriously bummed. Uncle Forry gone.

Just wished the guy a happy birthday. I know he was 92, but hell, almost all the good people are dead. I heard Ray Bradbury on Dennis Miller last week. Not sounding too good either.

Ahh well.

Slainte FJA.

Not Dead

Just extremely busy.
Some rough character sketches for a project my brother and I are tossing around.
More later...hopefully.
Sketches here.

Remnants

One of my brothers lives in middle-of-nowhere West Virginia. On our way to his house for V's first Thanksgiving we passed this lonely soul, still keeping watch.

Full Moon Industries

I'm late on this, but things have been nuts lately. Go check out Full Moon Industries for some sweet Halloween pics and general creepiness.
I particularly like the Psycrow, but what you should pay attention to is the lighting and the photography. Lighting is so important and so difficult to nail. I love good creeepy atmospheric lighting. I would like to see someone do an entire haunt with no props at all. just lighting and shadow.
Also, the pics, and there are far too few at the moment, are very grainy and slightly washed out. I really hope it was by design because it's brilliant. At a time when everything visual reaches for the hyper-detailed and overly saturated (still trying to figure why I "need" HD), a grainy, slightly out of focus image can be deliciously unnerving. Much like Bean's polaroids.
Some very cool oddities there as well. Check them out.



NOW!

I Want This on Top of My House 365

The incredible props at ScareFactory.

Snug Harbor Halloween 2008

To use his own words..."Finally!"
Well, "word" I guess.
Some pictures are up at SpookyBlue with more promised on the way.
I love the Grumble and the jack-o-lanterns. But it's this fellow "crow" that has really caught my attention. Grotesquely distorted and vaguely human I am fascinated by this thing. Part of a new group called "Brigands" that will be one of his new project sections. I can't wait! Pay particular attention to the "skin" of Spookyblues' corpses. It's beautifully decrepit.
If Pumpkinrot is the one who inspired most of us. Spookyblue is the one who first taught most of us to follow that inspiration. I can't wait to see more.

See The Gallery here.

Season of Shadows

Some wonderful atmosphere in these Season of Shadows yard pics. Looks like a movie set. The new groundbreaker is one of my favorite props of 2008.

Lustmord - Other

Beautifully dark and creepy. Another must have from Lustmord for that special mood whilst toiling away the hours in one's creature shop. Or just putting a nice dark spin on driving home from work. Whatever works.

Dave The Dead

Some beautifully original work by Dave The Dead.

Grim How To

It's Grim Hollow day at TtP.
Grim has posted some cool Step by Step's to both Grim and the Cloaked Ghosts on his site.
I'm trying the cloaks first. I want to get that down and see if I can put my own spin on them. I love the hands!
Thanks Grim.

Halloween on my Desktop

A few images - a little XML tweaking and voila! Grim's cloaked ghost greets me when I log into my work machine.

Fun. Want to do more.

Rotting

Flickr set

Target Still Has Some Deals

Picked up this witch's cauldron coffee mug at Target today.
They still had some items left on a shelf at 90% off! So I got it for .40¢. Cool!

They're Heeeere.

No need to really discuss it. Just get over there and check out the brilliance that is Pumpkinrot.

Brick by Brick Dear Fortunato

Greetings Everyone,
I'm making some changes to Through The Patch. Moving it onto my own server so I can build the pages myself and have more control. The blog will stay here but the url is now blog.throughthepatch.com. (It was www.throughthepatch.com if you were linked. That will now take you o the main page)
GhoulTV will have its own page and I am REALLY hoping to have at least an introductory segment before the movie. Might as well put the props to work right?

Speaking of props. I am using this week to brainstorm ideas to start working on next week. (Although this weekend is my anniversary and next weekend is V's christening so time will be short...hmmm). I briefly toyed with the idea of trying to recreate "The Great Pumpkin" in mache. Linus, Lucy, Charlie Brown...the whole gang. Then I snapped out of it.

Also, I would like to get back to work on a little experiment of mine.
The thought crossed my mind some time ago that a microblogging service for Haunters and Halloween lovers might be something of interest to...well to somebody. I like the idea of being able to stay in near instant contact with fellow haunters.

I had a new server that wasn't doing anything...so I built one.

The result is Hauntr
A microblogging service for the Haunter and Halloween lovers.

I would say that it is in the earliest stages of Alpha, but I want to get it out into the world and see what, if anything happens.

But if this sounds like an idea you find intriguing I ask that you give the site a try and give me any feedback you can on problems you encounter, and you will encounter some. Also, if anyone wants to design a header or an icon that would be great. But I am working on something a bit more appealing.
I had to build an xmpp server as well for the posting so as an afterthought there is also a throughthepatch IM network and email accounts too.

Anyway, if you decide to sign up everything should be working except openID registration and IM posting. IM posting has been a beast. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I am working to fix it. But you can post from the web, post from email and receive SMS notifications.

So, if anybody wants to try it out please enjoy and friend me. (I'm renfield) .

Slainte!

Fading

Something Wicked This Way Comes

Three of my favorite haunters are working on showcase pages for their haunts this year.
The anticipation is making me fidgety.
Fortunately they have posted a few shots to tide us over until the full glory of their work is revealed to us.

Spookyblue

Spooky's tutorials helped me get started in the haunting life. The Grumble and son were big influences I have yet to rip-off...I mean emulate. His blog is also so well written with hysterical and often poignant stories that it is required reading for me.

Season of Shadows

Another beautiful and inspirational site that also dives into the paranormal. This year, he launched a video series - Halloween Haunter's Reality. It's fantastic. Gives you a first person look at creating props. The prop he created this year is one of the best groundbreakers I've ever seen. I love these videos. Hope they keep coming.
SoS's John also has a very interesting site call 'Wind of the Soul' which explores spirituality and inner topics. He even has a podcast. Busy guy!

Pumpkinrot


Well what can I say about Pumpkinrot that hasn't already been said - by me or by anyone.
He is the patron saint of Haunters, raising it to an art form . The reason I began building props in the first place was a result of stumbling across his site. Every year's haunt is a theme with backstory for the scarecrows and this year he outdid himself with the Hollowmen. He always does wonderful photos and video of each years haunts.

These are the sites I am constantly refreshing my Google Reader for. Cannot wait to see your final pages guys.

Grim Hollow Haunt

One of my absolute favorite haunts. The first time I saw "Grim" was on another site and I had the same reaction I had the first time I saw "Johnny Appleseed".
"I HAVE to find out who did this!" An amazing talent! I am obsessed with his cloaked ghosts and love his groundbreakers.
Check out his 2008 page here.

Final Resting Place

The jack-o-lanterns were moved to the compost box. Where they will become soil that will be used to grow more pumpkins to be used as Jack-o-lanterns next year. Seems so noble.
You can't kill evil...you can, however, compost it.

Aranamuerta Haunt

I love this haunter's props. She does some truly wonderful and realistic looking full size figures. Check them out.

Halloween 2008 - Small But Sturdy

Some pics from my 2008 display. I only built 4 props this year but I think they turned out pretty well.
Plans for 2009 have already started and I will probably begin in a week or two. I have a lot to try.
More pics soon. The rest of these are here.

The Halloween House

A week ago I posted the local newspaper sory about a local haunters Halloween House. Well, the owners are extremely nice and invited me over to take some pictures on Halloween. Since the tots die down early in my neighborhood I went over around 8:30 and did just that. Here are a few shots with more available here.
Thanks Tony!

Halloween Has Come and Gone

Goodnight.

Happy Halloween

Well, it's officially October 31st and I just wanted to wish everyone a Happy and successful Halloween.
I can't wait to see all your pics and vids.

I leave you with this -

Top 5 Movies I MUST see at Halloween:

10 - The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
9 - Dracula
8- Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein
7 - Pumpkinhead
6 - The Uninvited
5 - Halloween III
4 - Halloween
3 - Sleepy Hollow
2 - Frankenstein
1 - Bride of Frankenstein

Morning Dead

Awesome Pumpkinrot/Pumpkin Hollow Card

How cool is this!
Can't wait for the new products from these guys!

Thanks for the card Bean! V says "AAAAaaaaghhhhrruuuuuhnmmmAAAH!"

Happy Halloween!

Scarecrow 2008

I'm calling him Grimm.
It's a very light year because the baby is currently ruling the house. But I'm relatively happy with this guy. There's also a rot inspired ghost up. But I have some final touches to apply to him.

Also, I'm experimenting with HDR but have not purchased a license for the software yet, hence the watermarks.

Another shot.

Local 'Halloween House' Story

Steph did a story on a local haunter who has an incredible house for Halloween. And I mean the actual house! Look at this thing! I'd kill for that house.
In a very rare lapse of professionalism Steph brought me and V along on the interview to see the place.
As usual with Haunters they were extremely nice and let me bottle feed V in their house.
Hoping to go back and get some high quality photos this week.

Here's the story.

What Was That?

Ghost blood

Ghost blood
Originally uploaded by Johnny AM

Before

Before
Originally uploaded by Johnny AM

Great Prop

A great prop inspired by a crap movie.


Also here

Ghost

The Mantle

Includes my clay pumpkin head, Jack-o-lantern door hanger by Pumpkinrot, Carnival Jack by PumpkinHollow, Cabinet of Dr. Caligari Lightbox by Morbid Decor and the coffin my Haunted Hot Sauce came in.
Other shots.