# How NOT to...



## Longmont Haunt (Jul 26, 2016)

I've got to be one of the least crafty, most mechanically challenged people around, so I've decided to try to make Halloween props, of course!

Having very little knowledge to work with or speak of, however, I suspect that I will be a cavalcade of calamity for the foreseeable future, which should give you fine folks a few chuckles, and -- just perhaps -- save other newbies from making the same mistakes I am and will.

Please, please, please feel free to add your own fails, so we may all laugh and learn!

For the first entry, I'll start with the most immediate stupid thing I did. In an attempt to try dry brushing a styrofoam skull into something more menacing looking than the dinged-up store paint job, I began by spray painting it black. Just the cheap black spray paint at Walmart, which was like 99 cents a can. And boy did I saturate that baby! I wanted to make sure I got it all blacked out everywhere.

It only took a few seconds for me to realize the error of my ways.



















Apparently, spray paint melts white styrofoam! Ha!

I plan to go over this with acrylic paint and a brush to finish getting it nice and black before doing the skull white, and won't make that mistake again. I'm actually hoping that the melting will add to the creepiness of the finished product, cause it already looks sort of cool.

Anyway, Cheers!


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## Pumpkin5 (Aug 8, 2010)

:jol:It's a "live and learn" kind of thing. I did the same thing with 
E6000, my most favorite glue ever....(well, except for Glidden Gripper on foam, that is my ALL TIME FAV), but E6000 does all the dirty work for me. But do not (I stress DO NOT) use it on foam. You'll have much the same fortune as Longmont had, with his aerosol spray paint. For me, the revelation came on Halloween night, I was trying to repair a TOT's foam sword.....let's just say.....it was not successful. Bad thing about it, Robert (Bobzilla) had already warned me about the glue eating foam...in the merriment of the evening I totally forgot.


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## Pumpkin5 (Aug 8, 2010)

:jol:Hey Longmont, nice pock marks and eaten away bone on that skull....A happy accident.


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## The-Hog-Flu (Oct 21, 2013)

Pumpkin5 said:


> :jol:Hey Longmont, nice pock marks and eaten away bone on that skull....A happy accident.


I agree with Bob Ross, it looks cool. I've done that on purpose to get that effect. Works great for tombstones.

Welcome aboard btw. You'll learn a lot nosing around the forum.


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## corey872 (Jan 10, 2010)

I think you're actually touching on one of the key reasons I like Halloween... even those 'happy accidents' look great. I spend most of my time dealing with precise measurements, exacting details, precision fits, etc. Sometimes it's nice to just hack something out with a hatchet, paint it with a sponge, spray on some cobwebs and have a great looking prop.

I think the skull looks great. Hit it with some blood red spatter, spray on some hot-glue webs, assemble a LED flickering candle and call it done!


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## Sawtooth Jack (Apr 9, 2011)

We've all been there, although your melted skull does seem to have taken on some very interesting (in a good way) characteristics. Take a look around, lots of good info to be found out here from these folks. :jol:


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## shmork (Jul 30, 2015)

I think your accident looks pretty cool! There are a types of real-world cancers that can cause similar pitting effects on the cranium. If I were you I would just change the narrative to assume that that person had a serious pathological condition (zombie virus?).


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## spinwitch (Jun 14, 2009)

But I like Longmont's idea of a "how I screwed up" thread. I'll start with a couple:

Thou shalt not forgot to apply mold release, unless thou wants hot-glue fangs and claws permanently attached to a piece of PVC pipe.

Thou shalt not use a heat gun in a righteous and safe manner, turn it off, place it properly upon it's back to cool off--and then reach over it to pick something up (ouch!)


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

Thou shalt not puncture the balloon you used as the base for a papier mache prop head until AFTER it's completely dried.


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## The-Hog-Flu (Oct 21, 2013)

Though shall not use "great stuff" on the kitchen table.


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## spinwitch (Jun 14, 2009)

The-Hog-Flu said:


> Though shall not use "great stuff" on the kitchen table.


I bet that got you into trouble!


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## The-Hog-Flu (Oct 21, 2013)

spinwitch said:


> I bet that got you into trouble!


Did I ever! The wife was mad as a hornet. I had to sand down and refinish the table.


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## Longmont Haunt (Jul 26, 2016)

How about, thou shalt not put your drink on your painting surface!










Anyway, I hope I'm turning lemons into lemonade! Just a first coat, but I looked up festering wounds for the melted part.



















Cheers!


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

Looks good, Longmont. See, there really is a silver lining in every cloud:jol:


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## Hairazor (Mar 13, 2012)

LongmontH, looks like you are pulling this off nicely


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## kprimm (Mar 14, 2009)

Only bad experience I've had so far was making a great foam tree. It fell over and I tried to save it by grabbing it. Giant mistake! The foam covered all my entire hands and it took a solid week to get it off. Of course I was like Spiderman and could literally climb a wall by myself.


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## The-Hog-Flu (Oct 21, 2013)

Thou shall not use your wife's kitchen knives to cut prop materials


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

Thou shalt not touch the tip of a glue gun to see if it's hot enough.


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## The-Hog-Flu (Oct 21, 2013)

RoxyBlue said:


> Thou shalt not touch the tip of a glue gun to see if it's hot enough.


lol.... I still do that every other time


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## spinwitch (Jun 14, 2009)

The-Hog-Flu said:


> lol.... I still do that every other time


Ever watch the how-to's from Stiltbeast Studios? He *always* tests the heat gun on his arm.


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## Bone Dancer (Oct 7, 2005)

^ its almost a trade mark for Allen.

And if you havent seen his how-to videos you really should.

http://www.youtube.com/user/StiltbeastStudios/videos


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## Evil Bob (Sep 1, 2005)

I speed-dried latex in the kitchen oven. Everything tasted like ammonia for two weeks.


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## matrixmom (Aug 20, 2011)

I used glue dots on walls for scene setters....about 2 years ago. Hubby still finding them.


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## The-Hog-Flu (Oct 21, 2013)

Forgot to rinse out the kitchen sink after clean up yesterday. Sitting down later watching tv and I hear the wife yell......"Jerry, is this dried monster mud in the sink?!!!!!"


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

LOL, THF, at least she knew what it was


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## The-Hog-Flu (Oct 21, 2013)

RoxyBlue said:


> LOL, THF, at least she knew what it was


I know, right?


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## ScareRookie (Aug 1, 2008)

*Hang in there*

The beautiful things about prop making is most things you are building shouldnt look clean, fresh and neat. It should look deformed, old, rotten, decaying, dirty, aged etc. So mess ups like this....just use them to your advantage. Just work the mistake in so it looks intended.

When I am making tombstones using Styrofoam, I purposely use spray paint to eat away at it. It makes it look more like stone. Add the white washing and you have an aged, broken tombstone.

So as its been said here, live and learn. Not all mistakes end up mistakes. A good imagination can turn a mistake into a really cool effect or detail.


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## HarBoe69 (Aug 2, 2014)

Thou shalt not use super glue on wives brand new counter top......oops! (Its only one small spot)

Thou shalt not spend hours carving foam for a spider and have it end up looking like an ant! (lots of great stuff later it did look like a spider)


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## Longmont Haunt (Jul 26, 2016)

Do not joke to your significant other that there's a storage facility across the street while she's complaining about the lack of space in the garage, lest she offer you a pillow and blanket to make yourself comfortable. :lolkin:


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## ryschwith (Oct 27, 2014)

Last year I was attempting to make a pool of radioactive sludge burbling up from the ground. Basically the Great Stuff coals that are so popular, except green and brown and yellow instead of red and black. Got the GS down, lonely texture. Started layering on lime green and dark green and a nice brown... got a beautiful looking pile of radioactive goo. Hooked up the green LEDs to make it glow... and realized all of that paint had made it completely opaque. No light visible. Had to scrap the whole thing and try again with a much lighter touch. (And, in all honesty, it still didn't really work as something viewable from the roadside.)

And that's not even getting into the disaster that was my FCG.


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## mikeythemars (May 10, 2008)

When adding servo driven arms to a skeleton, thou shall not use the plastic horns that come with the servos to connect them to the arm bones...unless ye wants to see said skeleton hurl one of his arms off when doing the last test run of his routine twenty minutes before the haunt opens. 

Moral: invest in those somewhat pricey cast aluminum horns.


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## austenandrews (Aug 22, 2010)

Thou shalt not borrow a neighbor's plastic spray bottle for acetone.


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