Make: Online: Halloween Archives

Archive: Halloween

June 27, 2009

Future death machine nose art

I'm pretty sure this TrueType font designed in 1998 by the now-apparently-defunct "Dragon's Den Type Foundry" was intended for players of Games Workshop's Warhammer: 40K tabletop wargame.

But c'mon, seriously: what project wouldn't be improved by a little faux-fascist heraldry? Perhaps a flying skull transfixed by a dagger and with lightning shooting from its eyes?

I can't think of one either.

June 22, 2009

Well, me, for one, and probably a bunch of other folks who don't care to be constantly reminded of mortality. We seem to be in the minority, however, with most deriving some kind of weird existential thrill, or deep Buddhist-y zen calm, from staring deep into the empty, black sockets of eternally grinning Death. Whee!

So, in honor of you deranged necrophiles, (especially you, Noah Scalin) I've rounded up three years worth of skullaphenalia from MAKE and CRAFT. Whether your taste runs to soft-and-cuddly pink death or cold-and-creepy-with-tentacles death, you're sure to find something among these links that quenches your malevolent bloodthirst. You make me sick! Also: Enjoy!

Livejournaler vomitsaw's bracelet is made from an etched PCB, with solder pads for eyes and mating RCA connectors as a clasp.

Cute death:

Shawn Bowman's sugar-skull tutorial will have you smacking your lips on sweet death in no time.

Tasty death:

Mark Kilner's "Numbskull" is a plastic skull covered in painkillers.

Arty death:

Wayne Martin Belger's cenobite-esque "Third Eye" is a century-old skull fitted with a pinhole camera.

Downright creepy death:

My own "Deathblinger" clock is a rhinestone de-gentrification of a high-falutin' designer diamond watch.

Miscellaneous death:

March 3, 2009

In the Maker Shed: Welcome to MAKE bundle

Announcing our new bundles available exclusively in the Maker Shed. This one is for any of our online readers that haven't subscribed to the print edition of MAKE. For a limited time we are offering a "Welcome to MAKE bundle" at an amazing discount.

The Welcome to MAKE bundle includes:

(1) Year subscription to MAKE Magazine $34.95 value
(1) The Best of MAKE $34.99 value
(1) Maker's Notebook $19.99 value

All for the discounted price of $48. That's an amazing 46% off the price if you purchased these items individually. Take advantage of this amazing deal before it's too late.

More about the Welcome to MAKE bundle in the Maker Shed

February 23, 2009

Gaping hole costume

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Clever gaping hole halloween costume.

January 9, 2009

Denture soap

Jenny @ CRAFT found these little gems in the CRAFT Flickr pool: soap made to look like dentures! These wouldn't be too hard to make yourself using a mouth-safe alginate to make a mold, then cast two different colors of soap into it! I'll keep this one in mind for next Halloween.

December 9, 2008

Robot crashes through the wall and still uses DOS

This huge, wall crushing robot looks like it might disrupt even the most rocking party.With an old school CRT as its head, it might be the ghost that DOS forgot.

Super-A

December 5, 2008

DIY Halloween contest winners

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It's almost time for the year end holidays but there's one last bit of Halloween business to take care, the DIY Halloween contest winners! It took awhile to get through all these, there were HUNDREDS --- Drum roll:::::::::::::::::

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Tech Grand Prize
The Magic Mirror - Arduino Powered

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Craft Grand Prize
Aliens Powerloader Halloween Costume

Check out the rest of the winners and congrats to the winning entries!

November 26, 2008

Giant inflatable octopus

This giant octopus was spotted in the Shoreditch area of London. Inflatable and made to catch passing wind drifts, the octopus moves in sync to appear as if it's alive and grappling the building. Interesting idea that definitely scared a few locals as the comments at the link below suggest.

via Monster Munch

November 12, 2008

The Great and Powerful Jake von Slatt!

I guess when you're known for being a virtuosic fabricator of fabulous tech-mods in cyberspace, you're kids aren't going to let you slide by with a wriggling animatronic hand from Target for Halloween. Here, the day before flying out to deliver the keynote at the California Steampunk Convention, Jake von Slatt presented this Wizard of Oz themed Halloween display at his house outside of Boston.

Hallowe'en 2008

Box of See's Candy costume

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I've been following Rob's Halloween costume build for a week, he made the most amazing box of chocolates costume from foam, paint, straws and other common items. Nice work!

November 11, 2008

Star Wars costume winners

[1st place Adult, Erin, Maris Brood]

[2nd place Adult, Kristin, Zombie Leia]

[3rd Place Adult, Kyle, EVO Trooper]

[1st Place Kids, Paige, Aurra Sing]

Rebelscum has posted the results of their Halloween 2008 Star Wars costume contest.

Costume Contest Winners

November 9, 2008

Deep Blue costume

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Deep Blue costume - one of my favorite costumes this year! Sponges writes-

Let me set the scene a bit: It's the summer of 1997 and World champion chess player Gary Kasparaov has been beaten in a six game match by two wins to one with three draws . But not by another man. A machine, built by men, has beaten him. IBM's Deep Blue could evaluate up 200 million positions per second, and capable of calculating 11.38 Gigaflops.

In honor of that stunning piece of engineering, I set out to make a suit, that, upon wearing it, I would be transformed into the most logical of logic machines ever built, a chess playing computer! It is not a perfect replica, by any means; I took many artistic liberties. I was inspired by Deep Blue's portrayal in S2E20 of Futurama, Anthology of Interest. It is rather the stylized idea of Deep Blue, the pop culture impressions of a thinking machine trapped in a big black box.
This costume took quite a bit of work, and erm, it was a bit on the more cumbersome side. But whose else has a mainframe costume? Incidentally, it was so cumbersome that It took me about 15 minutes to shove my way from one side of First Avenue to the other, missing the costume contest registration by just a few minutes. Once there I promptly put it in the coat check so I could breathe.

The frame of the costume is the remains of several cardboard boxes spliced together with duct tape, and the "thinking" lights on the front are controlled by the innards of about 27 little electronic dice, all wired together in a monstrous chain. Another set of lights scrolls back and forth over the speaker grille sorta like KITT, making the AI presence ever clearer. I added a pair of intake/outtake fans so I could breathe ever so slightly better inside, and finally a voice changing box to speak in a robot voice and say great classic things like, "Pitiful creature of meat and bone," and "How about a nice game of chess."

More:
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Chess champion loses to computer - and- IBM please open up Deep Blue already..

November 7, 2008

Plastic army man costume

By way of Laughing Squid comes this awesome plastic army man costume.

Plastic Green Army Man Halloween Costume

November 3, 2008

The painting that watches you

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From the MAKE Flickr photo pool

Lorier painted "Old Man Shifty" here and then added animated eyes recreating a classic haunted house prop. She employed a Parallax board plus sensors to track movement and trigger the animation - spot-on perfect!

- Painting with moving eyes

October 31, 2008

LED Costume

I give you my pick for geekiest costume I've seen this year: a giant LED costume. Yes, I agree with you that it should have real LEDs on the inside:)

Spooky (and free) audio effects

X-Orcism Plugin

CDM points out this free Halloween themed effect for VST/AU compatible audio software. You can download the plugin from Solid State Logic's site (free reg required). Nice to see the neighbors aren't the only ones giving out free treats.

It's basically a pitch-shift + vibrato + wind noise + eco/reverb combo ... which means it's fun -
helpme.mp3

helpme.mp3