Halloween Lighting Tips

Halloween Lighting: Less is Best
The most important words to live by with lighting especially a haunted house. The area should have low level lights with an emphasis on certain areas. This will also help keep the lighting budget low. Try using things such as low voltage lighting. The Malibu lighting kits from Home Depot (or any other hardware type store) are perfect. Also, try getting creative with Christmas tree lights. They can be put behind, around, on top of, inside many different items to give unusual effects. Thanks to great marketing strategies most stores already carry many of these lights in many different colors. Think about indirectly lighting objects. Shadows can be even more impressive in a haunted house than lighting an object directly. By not lighting objects completely people will be able to use their imagination to scare themselves. Plus you can use more bland props to scare people without spending lots of cash on detailed props, or spend less time making the details.

Halloween Lighting: Colored Light
Using colors you can set different moods in your haunted house. The best method of coloring light is to go to the nearest Theatrical Lighting Supply store (check the phone book) and purchase sheets of gel. Gel is similar to cellophane. It is a transparent sheet of thin plastic that is colored one of many, many colors. A 24x36 sheet will run about $6.00. The gel can then be cut and placed in front of the lighting instrument to produce all sorts of colors. You can even tape several different colors of gel together to place in front of one light. Experiment and you will soon see what a difference color can make. Another way to make color is to use colored light bulbs which can be purchased from any lamp store for slightly more than a normal light bulb. Think about what you are lighting and what would be the normal color for where you are. If you are trying to create the light of the moon try a pale blue, or orange for a nice harvest moon. If creating the light of the fire use orange and yellows (if you use gel for this there is even a color called "flame")

Halloween Lighting: Strobes and Flickers
A great effect in a haunted house is a flickering light acting as a candle. One way to produce this effect is go to a lamp store where you can normally choose from several different chandelier type lamps and sockets. Or you can again visit your local theatrical supply store. They will have plastic molded candle lamps ranging in price from $20-$200. Although close-up none of these effects really can pass as a candle you can do some simple tricks to make it more realistic. One is the placement of the flickering source. Place it out of direct sight of the viewer, either below, above, to the side of the people. As it flickers off of props, walls, or peoples faces (a great effect) the results can be stunning. Even you would have a hard time believing it is not a candle. Also a great thing to do is bounce it off of mirrors. When it comes to strobes, the choices are great and will vary in prices between $25-$2000. It all comes down to brightness and control. If you have the money and want a strobe, buy one with a time control on it. Every situation is different and you will achieve better, more realistic effects if you can experiment with the speed of the strobe. Strobes can be found at theatrical supply stores. Another source for both strobes and flicker effect is a device known as a flicker generator. These are expensive but very useful. You can plug almost any fixture into this device which plugs into a wall outlet, you then set the speed of flickering/strobing. This device will let you set the high and low level of the flicker plus the speed. Very cool items found at your theatrical supply store.

Strobe Light Usage - Lightning? Often times people will purchase a strobe light and just turn it on in the yard. Well that looks like nothing more than a strobe light in the yard. Instead try this for a more effective approach to lightning!

1. Get a milk crate.
2. Attach thin pieces of wood on all 5 sides.
3. Paint the wood brown and weather treat it. (Make it look old)
4. Place two strobe lights in the crate, set the strobes up so that they are both very slow, make one a little slower in flash rate than the other.
5. Connect both strobes to a power bar in the crate.
6. Run an extension cord from your house to the crate, the crate should be out in your yard facing the house.
7. Occasionally flash the strobes for a realistic look of lightning!

Halloween Lighting: Fixtures
Well there are many options, you would be surprised what your common household lights can do if you tweak them just a little with the previously mentioned ideas. But if you need more try checking out your theatrical supply store. Let me warn you first that this stuff is expensive!!! You can easily spend hundreds and thousands of dollars. But since most of us won't be doing that, check into some rentals for several of your big effects and fake the rest with what you own. Some things to try would be an ellipsoidal light. This will give you a focused beam of light and depending on the size you get you can obtain many sizes over distances from several feet to several hundred feet. One great thing to do with these lights is put gobos in them. Gobos are patterns cut or carved into a metal or glass disk and placed inside the ellipsoidal. By focusing the instrument the pattern is then projected. Many stores now have these to plase their logo on the ground. If you rent the instrument for $20-$40 and buy a $9 gobo you have a relatively inexpensive effect that you could use for your finale or maybe outside to draw people to you house. A par is a wash light that will spread light over a wide area. Pars come in many sizes. Most people have used a Par 38 outside in their patios and yards as they are the typical 150w screw base lamps. These are perfect to use if they are gelled.

There is a great deal of things to do with lighting but the best way to figure it out is to play, play, play. Keep trying different fixtures, colors, positions, etc. You may be surprised at the things you can do if you give it a try.

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