Alright everyone ... I am proud to present my Cauldron! This project was inspired by Woody Carr's Cauldron at www.scarefx.comI modified it a bit to fit my taste and to follow the rules of this contest. The "rivits" on the bands of the cauldron are styrofoam balls cut in half. 12 halves all together. And since the rules said I could use other items with my "SEI" The Banding is made out of Dow Sill Seal Window Insulation foam, the rim of the cauldron is made out of a pool noodle, and the base of the whole cauldron is a 55 gallon plastic barrel.
Dusk shots
Night Shots
And some Day Shots
And now for something that somewhat resembles a "How-to" If you want you can skip over mine and go directly to Woody's How-to at http://64.226.23.133/woodycarr/scarefx/project_witch_cauldron.html
Or you could try and attempt to follow my directions.
Step one Obtain a 55 gallon plastic barrel and cut it down to size using a drill to make a starter hole and a jig saw to make the cut. (I will not be held responsble should you decide to do this and end up missing fingers or other body parts.) I cut just under the first band that goes around the barrell.
(try and ignore the fog... I was testing my machine that day and I got a little ahead of myself) You can see the piece that I cut off laying in the bed of the truck... this part wasn't used.
Also use a drill with a wide bit to drill a whole in the bottom of the barrel big enough to feed your extension chords through. And if you plan on using this prop outside in an uncovered area drill several holes in the bottom so it dosen't end up filling with water when it rains.
Next a Pool noodle was cut lenghtwise with a regular kitchen knife. So it could be fitted around the brim of the cauldron.
Yes you could choose to use pipe insulation... but I chose to use a pool noodle because I liked the size and it was only 50 cents on clearance... You'll actually end up using 1 whole noodle and 1/3 of one if you use my method. These pieces will be glued together around the brim with hotglue.
Next paint just the barrel with some type of flat black spray paint. I found this cheap kind at Lowes for 89 cents a can... I used two cans and it coated and stayed on the plastic barrel nicely.
I also painted the inside of the barrel but I didn't worry about getting a completely even coat... remember Darkness is our friend. *FYI leaning inside of a barrel to spray paint it ... is NEVER a good idea... (I might have killed a few braincells like this yesterday)
Next aquire some Dow Sill Seal foam It is a type of foam that is used to insulate window sills. I found it at lowes for $8 A roll.
This shows whats left of the roll after I used what I needed. I used two layers of foam on each "band" to give it thickness.
Paint your Sill foam, Foam ball haves, and pool noodle black. (remember spray paint eats styrofoam. I used a standard acrylic paint that I bought in the Craft section at Walmart)
With a Hot Glue gun start gluing the Sill foam around the Barell I did two bands of both two layers thick.
I used my wimpy little hot glue gun and ended up having to re load gluesticks every 15 seconds... so I suggest you use one of the bigger guns that takes the larger sticks. (If I had had one... I would have used it.) Chaing sticks that often aggrivated me.
Next Hot Glue the styrofoam Ball haves on (I cut my styrofoam balls in half with a regular kitchen knife)... You can do this however you want to I just spaced them out evenly and glued them on.
Next the entire "cauldron" got a dry brushing of light grey acrylic paint. I mixed some white that I already had with some of my left over black Acrylic.
This thing is huge compared to the 'Large Candy Cauldron" that my Witch Henrietta had last year. This years brewing will be much better.
As a final touch I also dry brushed a little brown onto the cauldron for an aged "rust" effect.
The last step is to carry it where you want it placed, I placed mine on top of a concrete block so the cords could come out the bottom. I also put some Blinking orange "Halloween Lights" under the cauldron for a fire effect. I have three strings and each one has a blinker bulb in them so they blink randomly giving a very nice fire effect.
Inside the cauldron is my fog machine (on a timer) and several strings of Green Christmas lights for a nice green glow. The whole project was washed by a light blue floodlight.
And Voila! There it is... I am very happy with my finished project. I couldn't have done it without inspiration from Woody Carr at Scarefx.com Thanks Woody!
This is Henrietta.. She is very pleased with her new cauldron, you can see it in her eyes!! (haha)
If you have any questions please contact me on here!
Happy Haunting!
Creepy Chris S
