If you ever wanted to create a movie quality Alien Rifle Prop now you can.
When automating special effects, the most important part is making sure that they are well timed.
With the Crittergram Capture Cam we'll combine several common components to create a camera that only takes pictures when critters move in front of it.
When running a large haunted house, you want most of the special effects to be automated.
They're everywhere — in car taillights, traffic signs, and reflective tape on clothing. Unlike an ordinary mirror, a retroreflector bounces an oncoming beam of light straight back to its source, no matter the angle.
Decipher the siphon and build a high-class practical joke, with this ancient prank from Bill Gurstelle's "Remaking History" column.
Sometimes the sun is my friend, warming the house on cool days.
Use coffee shop straws and stirring sticks to build interesting geometric shapes. The baristas don’t tend to mind, especially if you tip generously.
Pepper’s Ghost is a special effects technique for creating transparent ghostly images.
Turn the mechanical pulsing action of your pulse into an electrical signal with this sensor that fits over a fingertip and uses infrared light to detect blood flow.
Interactive Halloween props are always fun and they are surprisingly easy to make. This year I designed a simple system that rotates a skull to face you and follows you movements as you walk by.
To accomplish this I used light sensors to detect a person's shadow. An Arduino microcontroller then calculates where they are standing and activates a servo that turns the skull to face them. When they move, the skull turns to follows them.
Hide an amplifier and speaker in plain sight with a project that gives a new meaning to bookshelf speakers.
