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Step 4Wire it up
Display your skeleton however you see fit. Ideally, you need to put it all together without relying on the pumpkin to support itself, because decay makes your bones gooey.
The engineering can get pretty ridiculous if you let it, which I did for this guitar-playing skeleton:
I planted a wooden dowel into a barstool, added a horizontal dowel to handle the weight of the torso, drilled holes through the appropriate parts (spine) and "threaded" the parts onto the dowel. I made a few extra vertebrae for between the skull and torso sections, and for where the tailbone meets the spine.
The skull sits on a ~3" wheel-shaped piece of wood (wrapped in plastic so it wouldn't stick) which was screwed into the top of the dowel.
Arms & legs were wired together with thin welding rod and wire hanger. A horizontal rod with loops at the ends provided a "clavicle" from which the arms could hang.
Another option: for 2009's creation I used several ruler-like bits of wood with holes drilled in the ends, zip-tied together. Provided a platform for the leg and arm bits, affixed with hooks made from hangar wire. Not as "pure" as previous years, but held up much better to transportation (it spent time at my kids' school, and at two other locations, not counting my front porch!).
Note: For best results, shish-kebob the long bones with wire, then attach to the adjacent bones. Eventually you end up with a wire armature to support all of your pumpkin bones.
I wired the legs to the stool and affixed the guitar with wire hanger. Some black felt inside the skull added some contrast and creepiness (just begging for red LEDs - maybe this year?).
As I mentioned in step 3, it can be a really good idea to leave some skin. I was able to wire the more generously skinned fellow up with far fewer collapses and such, and he survived transportation on the roof of my car (in a plywood coffin, of course) far better than his predecessors.
The "Laptop" pose was more symmetrical than the guitar pose, which also simplified the wiring. The only caveat was weight: I left far more material on the pumpkin, so it was a few notches heavier and tended to want to fall forward, so I wired him to the downspout.
The book that the 2009 skeleton is reading is quite heavy and sitting on little bits of plywood. I shifted his torso back to balance out his legs a bit, after which he seemed quite comfortable.
The engineering can get pretty ridiculous if you let it, which I did for this guitar-playing skeleton:
I planted a wooden dowel into a barstool, added a horizontal dowel to handle the weight of the torso, drilled holes through the appropriate parts (spine) and "threaded" the parts onto the dowel. I made a few extra vertebrae for between the skull and torso sections, and for where the tailbone meets the spine.
The skull sits on a ~3" wheel-shaped piece of wood (wrapped in plastic so it wouldn't stick) which was screwed into the top of the dowel.
Arms & legs were wired together with thin welding rod and wire hanger. A horizontal rod with loops at the ends provided a "clavicle" from which the arms could hang.
Another option: for 2009's creation I used several ruler-like bits of wood with holes drilled in the ends, zip-tied together. Provided a platform for the leg and arm bits, affixed with hooks made from hangar wire. Not as "pure" as previous years, but held up much better to transportation (it spent time at my kids' school, and at two other locations, not counting my front porch!).
Note: For best results, shish-kebob the long bones with wire, then attach to the adjacent bones. Eventually you end up with a wire armature to support all of your pumpkin bones.
I wired the legs to the stool and affixed the guitar with wire hanger. Some black felt inside the skull added some contrast and creepiness (just begging for red LEDs - maybe this year?).
As I mentioned in step 3, it can be a really good idea to leave some skin. I was able to wire the more generously skinned fellow up with far fewer collapses and such, and he survived transportation on the roof of my car (in a plywood coffin, of course) far better than his predecessors.
The "Laptop" pose was more symmetrical than the guitar pose, which also simplified the wiring. The only caveat was weight: I left far more material on the pumpkin, so it was a few notches heavier and tended to want to fall forward, so I wired him to the downspout.
The book that the 2009 skeleton is reading is quite heavy and sitting on little bits of plywood. I shifted his torso back to balance out his legs a bit, after which he seemed quite comfortable.
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Oct 18, 2009. 8:46 AMANTQNUT
says:
huh is that second picture made with pumpkin too? really cool stuff!
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