A favourite prop of many Bizarrist’s is a human skull, usually one that is very old and has been dug up under rather peculiar circumstances. It usually has a very strange history to go with it.

Now you could have a marvellous story to go with it but if the skull you are talking about looks like something that came from a novelty shops at Halloween, you are going to lose your audience.

I put together a number of human skull kits. They are anatomically correct and full adult size. They are sold in hobby shops in America. If you take care when you are putting all the bits and pieces together they look quite good, but still not like the one in your story. I did some experimenting and finally came up with one that even scares me! The plastic that they make these things out of does not take well to staining. This is how I made the one I now use.

After completing the kit and allowing plenty of time for all the glue to dry, I started on my skull. First of all I removed the lower jaw. All skulls look a whole lot more frightening without the lower jaw. Then I extracted several teeth on the upper jaw, in the kits, the teeth are all glued in seperately. I removed teeth, then glued some back until it had the look I wanted.

Next I covered it with white glue. When it was almost dry but still tacky, I took plain white absorbent cotton, pulling it apart and pressing it to the skull. This does a few things. One, it covers all the seams of the different parts of the skull and two, it allows you to stain the whole thing.

Let it dry for two days, then carefully pull most of the excess cotton from the skull. Don’t worry about it looking sort of fuzzy. Using a stain, I like Golden Oak, brush/dab at the skull until it looks like it is decaying. Let the stain dry for at least a day or two.

Now comes the spooky part. Dig a hole in the ground and put the skull into it, then bury it. Mine stayed buried for a month.

With care, dig it up. It is a shocking sight when this thing starts to peek out at you from the soft earth. Remember that feeling when you are telling the story and communicate it to your audience. After all, you can now quite truthfully tell them that you dug it up.

Brush off the loose soil and check to make sure no bugs made their home in it. Do any touch up work that may be needed. You now have a very human skull that looks as it it had been buried in the ground for a century or more and may even give some of your audience nightmares.

One final touch. A few drops of the Essence Of Antiquity (or ‘Damp/Earthy/Musty) on the matted cotton will give you a skull that not only looks real but smells real too.

Note. Since writing this a few years ago, the skull kits have become difficult to obtain but there are now some wonderful plastic skulls available from high class Halloween stores which, although not perfect, are better than nothing.

OTHER PROPS. 

Many of you may have an old flash wand tucked away someplace. It is a brass tube painted black with white tips. Press the plunger on the bottom and it sends juice to the glo plug coil which ignites the flash paper/wool on the other end of the wand along with smoke. It can be a nice tool for a wizard but not whilst it is looking like a magicians wand. I used one for years until the coil burnt out and I had a problem finding batteries narrow enough to fit the tube.

To change the appearance I used a plastic shoehorn with a goats head on one end. I mounted the head on the end of the wand, with wax added some evil looking features and finished it off with some hair from my dog who seemed to be always shedding. It did not take close examination but even from a short distance it looked fearsome.

Now I have never been any good working with wood but can do a hell of a job with cardboard. I made a small coffin to carry my prop,’Pazuzu’ in. It is made of double and sometimes triple ply cardboard. It takes staining beautifully, is as strong as wood but I can make it with a ruler and razor blade. The trick is to decide what shape coffin you want and make a template of it on a single piece of cardboard. Using that for your guide, you can now cut out the panels you need to build your coffin or special box to carry your props in.

With all your props, you are only limited by your imagination.

So Mote It Be,
Brother Shadow.