Initial frame for giant spitting spider.
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Close-up of the "undercarriage".
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Who knew that pool-noodles could be so versatile?
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Adding black duct-tape on the leg joints.
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Duct-tape finished.
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Smearing Great-Stuff (tm) spray foam on the legs. Messy stuff! DO NOT get this on your skin!
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Great-Stuff foam finished. Added 3 blocks of 2" styrofoam to form the head.
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After painting the legs and an initial shaping of the head.
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Here's where the eyes will go, but I later swap these out for bigger eyes.
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This picture gives you a sense of scale. The spider takes up 2/3 of a 2-car garage!
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This is what the old grave digger looked like after I pulled him out of storage. Hmmm, he needs some work.
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Here I am rigging his arm and head to be animated for the first time.
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Rear-view of the new grave digger animation.
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Close-up of the grave digger animation. Incidentally, this is the same "Deer" motor
that was originally used in the witch to make her head turn side-to-side way back in 2006!
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Here I am prototyping the circuit that I will need to use with the Arduino microcontroller to make my spider "spit".
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Here is the spider with his new "fangs" attached. I carved and shaped these fangs by hand out of styrofoam.
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Side-view of the head and fangs. The white tube going into the orange bucket is the water line for the spitter.
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Here is the circuit I created and the Arduino Proto-Shield that I assembled. You can see the Parallax PIR motion sensor on the right.
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Closer view. There is a transistor missing from the top-left corner of the board. Oops.
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So what the heck is all this for? Glad you asked. When the spider sees "motion", it will
trigger a sequence that includes sound effects and multiple blasts of spray mist from the spider head.
There is an airline run off an air compressor that is switched on & off by a solenoid controlled by this microcontroller. The air
line joins in with a water line underneath the spider head. The negative air pressure created over the water line causes water to
be sucked up from the container of water and "sprayed" at the unsuspecting victim. I designed and
built everything you see except for the microcontroller itself, which I programmed.
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That's my daughter Grace checking out the coffin's new position in this year's display. Isn't she cute?
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Here's the beginning of actual setup. The spider is in place but his fangs are not yet painted.
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Ah, the spider looks better now that the pink fangs are now white!
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View of the display from the driveway. Note the strategic placement of the giant coffin!
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Did I mention the eyes light up on the spider?
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This thing is terrifying!
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The witch's cauldron got a complete overhaul and makeover. Yes, that really is
the same old cauldron, but completely redone.
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Closeup of the cauldron.
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The new cauldron after being initial lighting.
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Check it out... the moon was in perfect position for this shot!
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I had to rebuild the top portion of the witch's head. I removed the failed eye linkage setup
that never worked. I'm done fooling around with those eyes. It was never meant to be!
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Another view of the witch's new head.
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The display is getting close to being ready!
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Like my new gargoyle? Sadly, I didn't build it. Target for the win!
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Here's the updated witch scene. Big thanks to Mike Baker for doing much of the decoration in the witch shed! Great job!
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Why is the headless woman staring at me?
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I said it last year, and the year before... There's nothing funny about a scary
clown pointing... unless it is pointing at your neighbor's house!
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This part of the sidewalk is haunted.
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Testing out the fog machines. The ambient temperature just happened to be perfect... See
how the fog is hugging the ground? That only happens like 5% of the time!
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Another foggy view!
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