# Bola De Cristal by Gemmy



## Fright Boy (Oct 1, 2014)

I bought this the other year and have finally decided how to start my project.








But first, an overview of my prop.
I bought this at Ross for $19.99. I think because it was written in Spanish, most people ignored it. I believe they thought it might _habla espanol_. I too thought this might be the case, so I had one of the employees help me plug it in and check it out. Success......English!!!








He also comes with these groovy accessories. A wireless remote so you can trigger him from a distance. A wireless microphone so you can use your own voice, if you don't like any of the 5 preprogrammed sayings. And a power supply if you don't want to run it on batteries.








I love the detail of the feet. They remind me of Disney's Haunted Mansion.








He is lit from below by a blue and green light. His eyes also light up and his head rolls back and forth.








To give you a sense of size he is 13.5" from claw to claw diagonally.


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## Fright Boy (Oct 1, 2014)

I originally wanted to put him on a Roman column. I wanted to cut out the top of the column so he could rest down in it because I was afraid some kids might knock him over. The problem with this is that the sound from the speaker located in the bottom of the base would be muffled. I think I may hack it and bypass the factory speaker and run it to a speaker that I will have mounted in a square base. I found one in a video game that would work great.








I think they sell the olive wreath detail at home improvement stores. I think Ill put the speaker behind that and cover it in speaker grill cloth. I took video of him working and will edit it and post it later. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

I eventually want to record some short scary stories and have him recite them. I once saw a website where someone hacked it and hooked it up to an mp3 player. They just used the mic input.


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## Fright Boy (Oct 1, 2014)

*Building a plinth*

Ok, just a few weeks before Halloween, I finally have a game plan for how I wanted to build this plinth for this prop. I wanted to be able to take it apart for storage, so I devised a design that would use hinges with removable pins and a top that could come off. This however did not work as I had hoped it would, as you will soon see.

I started by going to Home Depot and spending $50 on raw materials (hinges are expensive). 
I had by Dad help me, as I needed a second pair of hands. We first cut all the sides needed for the base.








After we had them all put together








it was then time to assemble them. Here is one of the hinges holding two sides together. My plans called for 2 hinges per corner.








All sides together.


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## Fright Boy (Oct 1, 2014)

*We run into a problem*

Everything seemed to be giong well until we realized that the hinges didn't want to come apart or go back together easily. Some of the wood was warped and was putting pressure on the hinges. So I had to revise my plan. I decided just to keep it all together except for a removable top. This meant replacing all the hinges with brackets (which are cheaper anyway ) *now where's my receipt?
This pic looks pretty much the same as the other one, but I now have the brackets in place of the hinges.









I scored and cut my foam and glued it on with Liquid Nail. I used a log to put even pressure on two sides at a time while it dried overnight.








Dried and all sides together. The top still was not even from foam to frame. I have no idea why, I used a square.









I tried making a foam cutter out of an old soldering iron. This thing looks like something from an old Sci-Fi movie, but it belonged to my Papaw and I it love just for that. 








This however didn't work as well as I had planned. Apparently coat hanger wire does not conduct heat as well as I had hoped. Oh well.


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## Fright Boy (Oct 1, 2014)

For the top I just cut two pieces the same size and glued them together using Glidden Gripper. Tera, on her Youtube channel posted a cool video about different glues for foam, and she seemed to like this one the best. *I'll link that video later








On thing about using Gripper, if you get it on too thick you pieces will want to slide around unless braced of weighted down on a flat surface.

I needed a way to remove the top, but still not move around. So, I just took a spare piece of foam and cut it to a tight fit. I also routed nice edges to the top as well. Gotta love those finer details.









While all this stuff dried, I cut strips out of the foam and ran on my router table. Yes you can use foam on a router table; who knew? I used this to make a nice design to go under the top (and also at the bottom but I was low on foam, time and getting pissed cutting all those 45° angles on an electric miter saw (yes this worked too).








I then marked where the feet would be on the top and drilled a hole for the power cable.








I also drilled a hole in the foot of the Cristal Ball prop. The little black blob halfway up the leg is what my dad calls "Dum-Dum" or "Dumb-Dumb". It's a sticky rubbery type material that I'm going to use to keep my wire from sagging.


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## Fright Boy (Oct 1, 2014)

Here is a better shot of the bracket with the foam on.









Now for the decorative pieces. These were a pain! I just couldn't get the angles right in the corners. Finally, I got it to where I could cover my mistakes with calk and paint. So, on with the glue and clamps.









Filling in the gaps with calking.








Then cutting with a saw blade to make cracks in it. This is why I didn't just make it out of plywood. I wanted to really be able to age it.


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## Fright Boy (Oct 1, 2014)

Wow, I had forgotten about this post until I was reviewing my posts and realized I never followed up on this.
It has been in use for two Halloweens and has been a big hit.

Let's see, so where did I leave off? Oh yeah...

So, my next step was to coat it with Glidden Gripper.








Then I had to pick out a paint Color. I went with Coastal Cliff in a flat finish.








I then applied a layer of that to it.


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