The Costume
I decided that the easiest thing was to set up a type of mad science motif for myself, because I had plenty of stuff around the house that I could easily slap together to produce the correct effect. It was also an easy thing to dress up in; as it turns out, lab coats can be easily purchased from Amazon for all of seven bucks. I purchased it a size less than usual, because reviewers indicated that they make these a bit large. A medium-sized lab coat fit me just right, and it's a very quick and easy thing to throw on for parties or events of any kind. To further complete the ensemble, I also put on a pin (it's an Eye of Sauron symbol from the Lord of the Rings movies, but it looks like it could be any kind of evil-looking thing), and a lanyard from work with a nondescript card hanging off of it. I also had a pair of safety goggles hanging around my neck. Combined with a Cyberdyne Systems tee-shirt, it all gave the appearance that I was a lab dude from some evil corporation or something.
The TV Footage
As for decorating my room, I decided early on to make my TV into a centerpiece by using some science videos I had on hand (the Science is Fiction collection, comprised of numerous shorts made by a French filmmaker some decades ago; it's a supposedly influential series available from the Criterion Collection). Such a video is not scary in itself, but I always felt it could be just by turning the sound off; you wind up with a random assortment of weird-looking sea creatures close-up, including micro views of urchins and octopi, looking like blown-up tentacles, with polyps, plankton, and other weird-looking things floating around. Combine that with some of the scariest music imaginable, and the effect is appropriately eerie, otherworldly, and creepy. So, I popped in the first disc, and played one of the short films in a constant loop, showing nothing but weird tendrils and pulsating life forms.
The Music
Getting music together is a pretty simple task. Different music achieves different effects, but for the type of eerie ambiance I wanted, I primarily focused on music from the Silent Hill video games; Akira Yamaoka's score in the first two games presents a lot of weird, slow-moving industrial sounds, while games three and four have really strong beats and melodic guitars that produce a perfect Halloween-themed effect. That's not all though: I also populated my playlist with a lot of music by Trent Reznor, including tracks from Nine Inch Nails' albums, How to Destroy Angels' albums, and some of the soundtracks Reznor produced (including The Social Network and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo). I ignored all the really heavy songs, and focused entirely on the instrumental or ambient tracks (great picks would include tracks like "Help Me I Am In Hell," "At the Heart of It All," "Welcome Oblivion," "Parasite," "The Spaces In Between," various tracks from the Ghosts album, and more). On top of all that, I also culled some tracks from other soundtracks (such as Renhoelder's music from the film Underworld), and various other bands (including Massive Attack, Kosheen, Uneven Structure, Celldweller, Moby, and more). All of these tracks produce a mood that's very downbeat, perhaps even brooding, while the industrial or electronica aspects help match up with the mad science theme I was going for. Above all, they produced the perfect atmosphere, for they all sound very creepy and strange.
Once I picked out the music I wanted, it was just a simple manner of dumping the songs onto a thumb drive, and playing them on a speaker. I took the speakers in my living room, which are usually plugged into my TV, and plugged them into a boombox that could play from a thumbdrive, so the music ran separately from whatever was playing on the TV. So while the sciencey videos ran nonstop, I let the player run on shuffle mode.
The Lighting
It was my plan to keep my room dark the whole time, allowing only the TV to produce the necessary light. But, I happened across some unique lights in the grocery store that I realized would have been perfect. One was a red light bulb, which I screwed into the kitchen, so it would produce a scary red light out of the opening leading to the kitchen. I also found a green light bulb, which I applied to a lamp I have in the bedroom and set on the floor; it wound up making my front window glow a brilliant, perhaps alien, green color. Best of all though, I got a black light bulb, which I screwed into a free-standing lamp I have and aimed at the living room. At the right angle, it would make every white thing in the room glow in weird ways. Aiming it close to the front door, it would also make my lab coat glow really weirdly too. It's perfect for making normal things (such as rugs, pictures, papers, clothing, or quilts) look really abnormal.
To further reinforce the mad science look, I also procured a LED disc that makes an electric, static-like pattern across its surface. It can do this constantly, or react to sound (it is pretty awesome to play music and have the thing match the beat of whatever is playing). For the purpose of the evening, I just left it on constantly and let it give off a freaky green glow in the corner of the room.
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| I remember the Borg had a bunch of these in Star Trek: First Contact. |
The Stuff
To further transform my living room into a weird little mini-science-lab of some kind, I did some quick re-arranging of the furniture, so that the coffee table would be the most prominent thing. On the coffee table, I laid down some newspaper and slapped some random things on it. First of all, I had a rather deformed pumpkin. I initially carved it several days ago with a lot of crop circle style patterns, in an attempt to make it look extraterrestrial. Unfortunately, the pumpkin lost its structural stability, and started to slump inwards. However, I decided it still looked appropriate as a weird and deformed lump of pumpkin mass. I even lit a candle inside, so it would still produce a cool orange glow in unusual patterns.
Next, I took some bottles and jars I had. Many of them are antiques, such as pharmacist or poison bottles, which already look science-y. I filled some of them up with random liquids, such as milk, orange juice, cranberry juice, or just plain water. For the larger jars, I took some old leftovers I had and put them in; mixed seafood and split pea soup can look really gnarly inside a jar.
Additionally, I found a small misting device at the grocery store. I set it inside a bowl of water, and it produced a fine layer of low-lying mist all over the table, with multicolored lights.
From thinkgeek.com, I was able to get a set of shot glasses that look like scientific beakers. They're small, but they have the right shape and all the markings to make them look like real scientific equipment. I filled those up with cranberry juice, and drank from them on occasion to give the illusion that I was working on serums or something.
I had a ceramic skull on one of my shelves, which I moved to the table. Its top could open up to serve as an ash tray, but today, I left it open and filled it up with salsa, making it look like some bloody or pulpy material. It looked effectively wicked.
Lastly, I populated the rest of the room with some random embellishments to further make it look like I was working on some odd science experiment. I laid out some random books I had (such as a book about aliens, a book on web design, and that Simulation and Simulacra book), and a few papers on one of my chairs. I had an old mattress cover that I needed to discard, but since I had the black light going, I decided to drape it over one of my chairs, so that the light would reflect off of it and look even more weird.
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| Can I blind you with science? |
The Experiment
So, when the time came and the trick-r-treaters came around, I could greet them in my lab coat, saying things like "oh good, the new test subjects are here," or "these just came from the lab," or "you're going to take part in an experiment," or something like that.
The feedback from visitors has been pretty positive; one kid said I was a good actor (to which I said, "what? I'm not acting."), and plenty found the science videos in the background to be weird. They were all pretty intrigued by the random stuff I had on the table (some of the older kids said "that's sweet!" or "cool!"). I think they were also pretty impressed by the costume I had, even though it was pretty simple.
So, for a few short hours, I was able to illicit a few laughs and a few chills from some simple re-arrangements, a few new lights, and one cheap garment. Best of all, I could use these things I got this year over and over again in the next years as necessary. In fact, I wonder if I can get a fly-head mask and a fly arm, so I can be like the scientist from the 1958 film The Fly. I already have the lab coat, so why not?
So, if you're in need of a quick costume or a way to make your area look freaky, going the mad science route is a pretty easy, effective, and fun way to freak out some people during Halloween!
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