Looking for more original horror t-shirts to add to your collection? Fright-Rags has a good selection of well designed horror shirts of your favorite cult classics, creature features and slasher movies. These shirts are exclusive to Fright-Rags so you can’t get them anywhere else.
Being a huge zombie fan, I was initially drawn to the Obey (zombies make great social commentary) and Johnny shirt that says the classic line “They’re coming to get you Barbara!” Oh how right Johnny was. I also admire the simplicity of design on everyone’s cult favorite Ash (from Evil Dead), and Frankenstein.
I’m also really liking the Trick or Treat design based on looks alone. I have to admit I didn’t even know what movie it was from until I looked it up. It’s from a 1986 flick entitled Trick or Treat, that is “meant to be a parody of teen-horror-devil-worship movies”. The looks of this shirt, the rock and roll star cameos, the user comments, and description of the movie all tell me I’ve got to rent this soon.
Also worth checking out: Your Zombie Cafe Press store. Tons of Shaun of the Dead designs, and other zombie related shirts.
If you haven’t already, it’s time to start carving pumpkins. If you’ve already carved one up, it’s time to get a new one because it’s probably not as good as a Zombie Pumpkin. Each stencil is hand drawn and stylized by Ryan, the one man show, to work perfectly with traditional cut-out carving techniques. You don’t need to be a master carver for these stencils to come out looking good. But I’ll stop gushing over how awesome they are and let you get to choosing. The site’s been recently updated for the 2006 season with a new design and new stencils. Some of the newest are Stubbs the Zombie (personal fav), Head Cheerleader, Gizmo (from the 80’s flick Gremlins), and in honor of Friday the 13th, Jason Voorhees.
Don’t forget that the stencils can be used for other things besides pumpkin carving. We used the Pumpkin King stencil to decorate our pumpkin cake, and there are stencils made just for watermelons.
One of Zombie Pumpkins’ freebie stencils (and one of the coolest ones, IMO) was created from imagery on a bottle of Haunted Hot Sauce. They cleverly combine flesh-eating zombies with spicy food products to create a zombie themed hot sauce. It is also worth mentioning that HHS has a great website that doesn’t just sell zombie hot sauce in little cedar coffins. They’ve got some great tips and tricks for decor and props. Our top picks are the 13 Top Tips for creating a Halloween atmosphere, and how to “board up” your windows (we’d love to see more pictures of this one).
Happy Friday the 13th!
We just got word of an excellent shipping promotion going on over at BuyCostumes. Starting today and only lasting 6 days, Oct 7-12, they are offering $0.99 shipping on all orders over $30. If you don’t know already, BuyCostumes has more costumes than your local costume shop without all the crowds. So avoid the traffic and have your costume delivered for under a dollar before it’s too late.
Target.com is also offering a great shipping deal on Halloween costumes. You get free shipping on all costumes purchased online from now until October 14th. We went to a few local Target stores on the first of October and they were already sold out of a bunch of Halloween items. They have some nice decor items that look like they will sell out real quick as well. So hurry and buy online while the shipping is free and the best stuff is in stock.
Buy.com is also pushing their Halloween section with up to 50% off their selection of costumes, toys, scary movies, and more. There are some scary movie box sets that look pretty appetising with this added discount. These deals die on October 31st. In addition to this up to 50% off deal Buy.com is offering $10 off any purchase of $30 if you use Google Checkout to buy the item(s).
Check back later for some more Halloween steals and deals as it becomes closer and closer to the night we’re all dying for.
Being a zombie, whether for Halloween or your local Zombie Walk, calls for some blood stained clothes and makeup to get that rotting corpse look. Having been a zombie myself I wish I would of had some good looking prosthetics in addition to my makeup and dried blood. Just a little something like an exposed broken bone, part of my brain showing, or even have the whole side of my face peeling off would have been an excellent addition. So in an effort to help others get their full enjoyment out of their next zombie costume I’d like to suggest some prosthetics that would look great on any zombie.
The most popular place to put a prosthetic is on your face/head region as that’s where every one is staring to see if they should be ready for the Zompocalypse or if it’s just a costume.
My personal picks would be; 
A simple prosthetic add-on that can make a big difference without altering you face and perhaps creating usability problems while snacking on food at your Halloween party is this Broken Bone. Another simple add-on that doesn’t involve the face would be to slap on some bullet wounds. We all know zombies don’t care about bullets so I’m envisioning these placed upon your chest or arms with holes in clothes so you can see them. Only put them on your head below the eyes, because you wouldn’t be shambling anywhere if you sustained a shot to the brain.
If you’d rather get the personal touch and go the DIY route there are some places online where you can get some good tips and suggestions. So you wanna be a Zombie? has good explanations and pictures to help with ideas and techniques. There are also some decent tips and a few pictures for zombie makeup here.
Robots have been around in one way or another even before 50’s sci-fi movies made them popular. Since then robots have been evil villains in movies, lovable characters in TV shows, and even wise cracking comic relief in cartoons. The timeless robot costume is always a good choice whether you spend a day before Halloween spray painting cardboard boxes, or 5 months creating a giant handmade costume. We’ve gathered some awesome robot costume ideas to get your creative circuits flowing.
Make blogged about a giant robot costume that took 5 months to build and cost over $900 in parts and research. It looks pretty awesome at a towering 9’2″ tall (costumer wears stilts) and even has some good detail with a little bug that seems to control the robot.
Over at Instructables you can view how to make another giant robot costume, but this one is made of recycled materials. He built this one out of laundry detergent bottles, crutches, football shoulder pads, and lots of hot glue. This style is our favorite because it really lets you flex your creativity to come up with your own ideas. You can recycle, paint, or glue on anything that feels robot-y to you.
If you are more of a square and boxy type robot fan, then cardboard boxes are a good and inexpensive choice for a robot costume. I found a page where a group of college kids show us how they made their robot costumes.
You can get some more great ideas for cardboard built robots from flickr. 
This one uses the standard boxes, duct tape, foil, and throws in some fake gauges and warning symbols for an overall robotic effect. This one added used CDs for eyes and added eyebrows to get a more evil robot look. This one used reflectors for eyes, and what appears to be an off the shelf tap light and lots ‘o’ foil. A good amount of DIY robot costumes have some type of dryer vent tubing or similar material for arms. These are a simple and easy choice because they are inexpensive, easy to find (local home improvement store), and already a shiny metal looking color. Another good and easy accessory is tubes or wires going from one spot on your costume to another. You could even try integrating some old circuit boards from broken electronics onto your box to go for the exposed innards look.
Here is a list of what’s most common for building your very own inexpensive robot costume:
- Cardboard Box
- Silver Paint
- Foil
- Shiny Objects (CDs, reflectors, LEDs, etc.)
- Gauges and Meters
- Dryer Vent Hose
- Some type of Claws (for robot hands)
A lot of the items listed above can be found in your own neighborhood on trash day. Or if you are in a populous city you can check out the free section on your local Craigslist for some costume materials.
Of course we encourage you to get creative and try different colors, shapes, and sizes. Feel free to paint your face silver instead of putting a box over your head all night, or wearing gloves so you can carry around your drink at the Halloween party. Make it your own, with your own style and remember to think about what you’ll be doing while you are in the costume.
And don’t forget to brush up on your robot dancing skills.
Did you make a robot costume? Did you find useful pictures or tutorials online? Please contribute your findings in the comment section below.
On Halloween night, lawn decorations get the most attention simply because trick-or-treaters have to pass them to get their treats. Low lying fog, eerie colored lights, and spooky sounds are all just accents to your lawn decorations, which are the center of attention to your costumed visitors. My obsession for zombies brings us to an obvious choice for lawn decorations that should bring a scare or smile to anyones masked face.
First up is the Corpse Solar Light that cleverly combines a solar powered lantern held by an undead rising corpse. It rises 17 inches above the ground and requires no extension cord or batteries because it’s solar powered. Leave it out during the day and it will charge itself up to work at night. We own one of these and LOVE it. (Keep an eye peeled and you’ll see it show up in many of our photos.) Add a creepy tombstone to complete the look.
Next up is a ground breaking statue that looks a lot more realistic than the previous ones and doesn’t have a built in light. This personal favorite of mine is a zombie sculpture (shown at right) named “The Zombie of Montclaire Moorsâ€. It doesn’t have much of a rotting corpse feel, but it does have some great detail. You wont find this one at any Halloween store because it’s an exclusive to Design Toscano. They have some really quality sculptures, including another one of my favorites, by the same artist Alan Dickinson, called The Creeper. This sculpture hangs on your wall and it looks like a shadowy figure is coming right through the wall. Very creepy.
Another rotting corpse rising is this Sewer Zombie that emerges from a “sewer manhole, surrounded by putrid green bile”. Yum! FrightCatalog has more than a couple ground breaking zombies, but I particularly like the look of Grimrot. With most of his rotting body out of the ground, an exposed rib cage, and a missing arm, Grimrot should startle even the most prepared trick-or-treaters.
Another undead rising prop worth mentioning is this Lighted Groundbreaker Skeleton that mysteriously only has his body underground but all appendages are sticking out, and light up. This one requires 2-AA batteries and has removable stakes so it can stick into the ground or on your floor inside the house.
Don’t forget to set the stage for these undead creatures with a tombstone, fog machine, spooky lights, and some scary sounds.
