Firstly, I would really like to take a moment to remind everyone that Haunt on the Hill proudly raises money for The SickKids Foundation. We accept sponsorship to help with our efforts. You can see the list of current sponsors here and you can find out how your business can become a sponsor here. We also collect monetary donations on Halloween night, but if you can’t make it to the haunt and still want to donate, we also have an online donation page here. It is a secure way to donate and is done through The SickKids Foundation website, so you know it is legit. Please take a moment to consider donating, no matter how small the donation, every bit helps!

This year is the first year I am actively seeking sponsors. If you know of a local business that would like to help out, please contact me. I would also like to thank my current sponsors, some of which are not listed on the site yet, but will be as soon as details are confirmed.

As for an update on the haunt, I have been working hard on fixing up some things from previous years and making additions as well. At the end of this month, my countdown sign will be up on the lawn! Things are slowly getting done, but I assure you, they will all be done in time for Halloween 2010!

Enjoy the rest of your summer because before you know it, All Hallows Eve will be upon us! Mwahahahahaha!

Yours truly,

Rachel “Wednesday” Brown

If you’re familiar with Kathy, then you know she is one of the founders of the Midwest Haunters Convention in Columbus, Ohio, but what you may not know is that she is also a home haunter.  As a fellow home haunter, whose site is devoted to home haunting, I thought it would be interesting to look at the other side of Kathy, but since MHC is a big part of what she does, I also wanted to look at MHC from a home haunter’s perspective. 

So, check out my interview with Kathy, as I find out more about the home haunter!

Haunt on the Hill: Kathy, everyone knows you as one of the founding members of MHC, but what people may not know is that you also have a home haunt.  What can you tell us about that?

Kathy: Yes in addition to running MHC my family has a home haunt.  It is a two section graveyard divided by an arched gate.  We  have tombstones, skeletons and two moving props.  We have haunted music and thunder and lightning.  My 10 year old son has started doing his own scenes and dressing up scaring kids by chasing them with a chainsaw. We start setting up in early October and our neighborhood cheers us on!  We love doing it and the neighborhood kids and adults love it. Isn’t that why we do it?  Plus the scares on Trick or Treat night of course!

HotH: As a home haunter, I’ve always assumed that MHC was only for the pros who run professional haunted attractions.  What can a home haunter, such as myself, get out of MHC?

K: The Midwest Haunters Convention started out as a gathering of pro haunters but over the  years home haunters have come to love the show as much as the pro haunter. We all love to get dressed up and scare people. That’s what we do best!  A home haunter can learn from the same classes as pro haunters.  We build props, use make up and design scenes.  In addition, the show has a large costume ball with body art and costume contests.  Home haunters can also compete with other makeup artists in our Monster Make up Wars. Each team has 30 minutes to make a monster on a victims face and head using the makeup and supplies we give them.  Our tradeshow is the BIGGEST reason that home haunters come to MHC. We had over 2000 people on the tradeshow floor this year!  Where else can you find 50 Halloween vendors all in one location? 

 HotH:  My first and only experience at MHC had me both consumed with interest and terrified all at the same time.  (Scary clown chased me all day.  Turned out to be someone I know!)  What advice do you have for someone coming to MHC for the first time?

 K: If you are coming to MHC for the first time it can seem a little overwhelming. There are so many things to see and do in three short days.  My advice would be to go over the website carefully looking at the classes and events that you really want to do. Then add in some time to shop and make new friends. Another way to make it seem less scary is to talk to me about the show and get to know other haunters say on facebook BEFORE coming to the show. That seems to be the big thing for the show and why they come back year after year……FRIENDSHIPS.  Home haunters or pros we all have the same passion for scaring people.  It seems to bind us together in a strange and wonderful way.

 HotH:  I know MHC 2011 is a long way away, but are there any secrets and surprises we can expect? 

 K: The 2011 show is not really that far away. We are already planning the pre-convention tours to the Indianapolis area haunted houses.  More good news is that we have signed a two year contract with the Columbus Convention Center!  So come see what the haunters are talking about when they say what goes on at MHC stays at MHC..until it hits facebook.  Mark your calendars now for June 3-5!  Come scare with us!  Scaring the mortals in the hotel is FUN!

Check out these awesome pics of Kathy’s home haunt:

Thanks to Kathy of MHC!  Check back on Friday for an update on my own home haunt!

In fact, this Monday I will have a very exciting interview with everyone’s favourite haunter, Kathy Sheife….Shief….Schiefer, um Kathy!  If you don’t know who she is, you will come Monday!  Really though, if you are a fellow haunter, you HAVE to know who she is, even if you can’t spell her last name!

As for an update on props for this year, that will come soon.  However, if you look to your right, you will notice that there are only 64 days left!!!!  I better get to the dungeon and finish some things!  I also want to quickly point out that Shopper’s Drugmart already has their Halloween candy out!  It’s almost here!

Now on to today’s blog post:  Haunt clubs.

As I’ve mentioned in the past, I am a member of the OHC.  This is the Ontario Haunters Club.  It’s a website, a forum, and even a monthly get together to meet up with some of Ontario’s finest haunters.  Victoria Wolf, founder of the club, is a super nice lady and all the members are really helpful when I get stuck on how to do something.  I don’t really go to the meet-ups, but I do chat with a lot of the members online and I find them to be a valuable resource. 

If you’re just starting out as a haunter or have been doing it for years, local clubs are a great way to meet fellow enthusiasts.  So, no matter where you live, if you are a member of a local haunters club, post below in the comments and let’s get the word out about all the clubs!

And don’t forget to check back on Monday for my interview with Kathy Schieferstein!  Look Ma, I did it, I think.

And a big thanks to all our new Twitter followers!

Rachel “Wednesday Addams” Brown

What got me thinking about candy was a post I came about on the 11 Points website, titled, “11 Worst Things You Can Get Trick-Or-Treating“.  To summarize, although the site goes into greater detail, there’s a bunch of the obvious stuff (apples and the like), but at number four is Dubble Bubble.  This is the only thing on the list that I truly disagree with.  As much as that small piece of rock solid pink gum is hard to chew and almost immediately looses its flavour, I always loved Dubble Bubble, even to this day!  By the way, number one on 11 Point’s list was Milk Duds.  I’ve never received Milk Duds on Halloween, nor have I ever even tried a Milk Dud, but the name Dud does not inspire confidence.

As for the razor blade in the apple story that we all heard as kids, Snopes.com has a full report here.

Now I open this up for debate.  What in your mind is the absolute worst candy to get on Halloween night?  What is the best?  In my neighbourhood, I can recall a time when one house used to hand out cans of Coke.  Not anymore though.  And now all the candy we buy is nut free for the allergic kids.  Sorry Reece’s Pieces, I know kids loved you! 

Oh and gross or awesome?  This Blood Bag candy is $5.99 per dozen on Oriental Trading.

Haunt on the Hill has it’s first ever Media Sponsor for the 2010 season, ICD Insurance Brokers.  If you need home or auto insurance, contact Mike Leinwand. 

What is a media sponsor?  Well, they are a company or person who helps spread the word of the haunt in one form or another.  Starting this year and every year from now on, Haunt on the Hill will be sending out postcards to everyone in the haunt’s postal code.  That’s over 1000 houses!  Read them, collect them, use them to scoop up your dog’s poo!  No scratch that last one!  The postcards, aside from being a cool design, will have the basic details you need to know.  Times of the haunt, location, and a helpful reminder to bring money for charity!  And they wouldn’t be possible without the help of our media sponsor!  Thanks Mike and ICD Insurance!

Now here is the design so far for this year.  What do you think?  Good?  Bad?  Changes?  Also, a big thanks to my buddy Steve from Phantom FX for helping with some of the design work!

Check back for more updates on the haunt and be sure to stop by Monday when I look at the worst of candy!

Rachel

Part One – Hallowindow
Part Two – Bates Haunt

In the third and last installment of this series, I spoke with Andrew Grant, creator of Scaremation, an up and coming window animation maker, who has a very different approach to his work.  Check out this video of his animations, from his very own yard haunt:

Grant is yet another Canadian and a member of the Ontario Haunter’s Club, along with yours truly.  Read my interview with him:

Haunt on the Hill: With other people out there selling window projection DVD’s for Halloween, you’re the newbie.  Why did you want to get into this?

Scaremation: Being obsessed with Halloween, I was trying to think of a way to get more deeply involved in the business side of it.  I was gathering information about different aspects of the industry when someone said the obvious to me,  ”Why don’t you just do what you already do for a living?”, which is animation.

Because I animate all day every day, I admittedly didn’t like to think about it in the little spare time I had. That’s one of the reasons I love building Halloween props as it is visceral and I get to use power tools.

HotH: What makes yours different?

Scare: Many folks have emailed me asking why I would bother when they can just buy Hallo-window products. I LOVE Mark’s stuff as he has a cool style and really nice animation timing, but I wanted something that looked a bit different.  

We are offering up interior environments which are kinda cool, judging from the reaction of kids last year. Kids kept asking if they could come inside to “see the room with the funny people in it”.   (I hope they meant the projected room and not our real kitchen with our friends in it. LOL).  Within the environment we have the freedom to go to black now and again to show other animation to give it variety. 

We also questioned how intense the animation would be as we like the whimsical aspect of Victorian “Haunted Mansion” style , but also some nasty and bloody work. Trying to find that balance to keep it sinister. 

HotH: Are your DVD’s up for sale yet and if so where can we get them?

Scare: Not as of yet which is also frustrating for us. Being artistically picky (and having crazy production day jobs and family raising) we are creating, refining, sometimes wholly rejecting different techniques. These all of course take time to R&D. We know we are getting real tight for deadlines this year but having donwloadable content will help folks get it in their hands immediately. A physical DVD will most likely still be an option for those that want it.  

HotH: Would you ever do custom DVD’s if people had something specific that they wanted?

Scare: We are developing some techniques right now that could give haunters the ability  to customize our animation themselves to suit their individual haunts , or at the very least allow folks to work with us in an affordable way to make something custom.  I know that sounds “mysterious” but it could be something very cool.  Will keep that info up to date on the blog. That might not be in a saleable form this year but I suspect we will be testing it for my own front lawn to work out the kinks and see reactions.  

If folks had something crazy in mind we are open to all suggestions.  Ideas and budgets are usually all over the map but don’t be afraid to ask.  Even if a pro-haunt needed something big I have a network of local former co-workers and we all have feature film VFX experience. 

 HotH: Anything else we should know about your projections?

Scare: We hope that once we get them out there folks just enjoy them!  Its great to have variety to choose from , depending on the style of the haunt.  

Once again, big thanks to Mark Gervais, Dave Bates, and Andrew Grant!  Check back on Monday for another exciting update about props I have been working on and general haunt news!  And a reminder that if you have a site, product, business, etc… that you want me to feature, feel free to contact me via the “contact” page on this site.

This week we continue our inside look at outside projecting with Dave Bates of the Bates Haunt.  I came across Bates’ work on YouTube one day and was blown away at just how amazing his display is and to top it all off, he does it all using only ONE projector!  

Check out a video here, but I warn you, the song will get stuck in your head:

As with Mark Gervais, Dave was nice enough to let me interview him.  And here it is:

Haunt on the Hill: As far as I can tell, you sort of started the idea of projection haunting.  I had never seen it before coming across your YouTube vids.  How did you get the idea?

Dave Bates: I think I was the first one to do large scale projections on the outside of a building as far as I know.  I always had wanted to haunt using a projector.  I assume this is because I am a Haunted Mansion fan, and also because I was getting tired of setting up a big prop based haunt every year.

HotH: Where do the ideas for the songs come from?

Bates: Basically I am trying to give each element of the haunt a song.  I want to do a ghost song next.  We’ll see if it happens this year.  I’m a fan of many different types of music, so I’m trying to mix it up a bit without totally messing up the feel (other than the Kiss song).  The first song came from my desire to have a theme for my haunt like Grim Grinning Ghosts.  It is supposed to channel the same feeling as that song and another mostly unknown kids song called “This is Halloween”.

HotH: If you had to give someone some quick advice on how to set up a projector for a Halloween display, what would your top tips be?

 Bates: Hook it up and try it out.  Projections and fog don’t work well together, and use really high contrast images.

HotH: I see a lot of people getting into using projectors in their displays, what is the next step?  Where do you see your projections in the future?

Bates: I did a project combining animatronics and projection, and I would like to do some 4D effects synced to the projection next.  This year I’m going to try to utilize the new High Def projection to add more details to the show.

HotH: Your haunt is not exactly “terrifying”.  It is more of a stop and watch display, which is what I try to go for with mine.  Is that what you were going for?

Bates: I carefully try to walk the line between scary and funny, much the way the Haunted Mansion does.  I don’t really get into the gore… I’d rather it just be cool, fun , and atmospheric.  But I have some plans to step it up a bit.  I’d also like to make it more interactive too as computers get faster and more capable.

HotH: If people wanted to get a copy of your videos for their own haunts, how would they do so?

Bates: I didn’t want to do this for a long time because I like being different, and I didn’t want knock offs of my haunt all over.  But due to popular demand I do offer a resource DVD with many of the elements in my show on my website.  Through the purchases I have been able to purchase a new projector, software and a video camera to help me in my efforts.  Thanks everyone!  I also have the eyeball available for free online as well.  I might be adding to the freebies soon because the DVDs are a pain.

HotH: What’s the best reaction you ever got from a trick-or-treater?  Worst?

Bates: My favorites are the little kids that don’t dare to come up the driveway.  One little girl freaked out when the jaws appeared on the garage right in front of her.  I don’t get a chance to watch much because I’m busy doing the glowing hand that gives the treats . I haven’t really had too many bad apples come to visit, so I don’t know if there has been a worst.

Thanks Dave!  For more info, check out Dave’s website here!  And be sure to check back on the site this Friday for part three of projection haunting, when we look at Scaremation!

Hallowindow in action!

Today is full of greatness!  Or weirdness, either way it’s a good day at the haunt!  First I thought you should know that there are two more parts in my series on projection haunting still to come!  The first was last Friday’s interview with Hallowindow, the second will be on Monday when we take a look at The Bates Haunt and lastly, next Friday we talk to Andrew Grant of Scaremation.  So much projectiony goodness!

Now what’s been going on with Haunt on the Hill you ask?  You didn’t ask?  Well I’m telling you anyway!  I’ve been hard at work on props for this coming Halloween and have decided that you deserve a sneak peak at one that I am especially proud of. 

As any past visitor to the haunt can attest, we have never had an opening/closing coffin, although we have attempted to for the past five or so years.  Something always seemed to go wrong or break at the last minute, but I did not give up!  I got my hands on a MonsterGuts motor and set to work on the coffin.  It’s not done yet, some tinkering still needs doing and a good ole monster hand needs to be fabricated and attached, but otherwise, it’s working like a charm. 

Here is a video I took using my iPhone:

I’ll have more sneak peaks on props in the works over the next little while,  so keep checking back.  In the meantime, I must remind you all that I am looking for sponsors to help raise money for charity.  If you know of a company or business that would like to help out, please use the contact form on this site to get in touch with me.  Also, if you have a website, store, product, home haunt, etc… that you would like me to discuss on this site, drop me a line and we’ll talk.  I’ve already been receiving lots of emails from people, but would love to hear more from my fellow haunters!

Fangs for everything,
Rachel

Quick update before the goodies: Haunt on the Hill will be taking a quick break on Monday, but will be back next Friday with new updates on the haunt and props currently in the works.  In the meantime, feel free to follow Haunt on the Hill on facebook and twitter, (links to the right) and by feel free I mean DO IT!  DO IT NOW!  Thanks!

Anyway, lately I’ve become obsessed with what to do for my haunt on a vertical scale, since I’ve pretty much run out of space everywhere else.  Last year I came across the website of Mark Gervais’ business, Hallowindow.  For those of you not in the know, Hallowindow is a collection of DVDs containing really awesome creepy animations that you project onto your window or garage.  What’s even more awesome?  Gervais’ is a fellow Canuck and I love to see my countrymen helping the haunt industry!

Here’s a promo video for Hallowindow:

Turns out Mark is a really great guy and didn’t hesitate when I asked him if he would let me interview him for the site!  Here it is: