This week on Sketchy Details @Home, I pull inspiration from season 5, episode 4 of SyFy's Face Off. The challenge was...strange. The contestants had to choose two random elements from a manufactured underground cave/jail system to create an original character that could live underground. It was never actually explained that way. They just kind of wandered off and started sketching. Then there were anatomy books and encyclopedias that were used for reference in the workshop that had nothing to do with the caves and they lost me for good. I tried to think of a way to add the random element to this episode, but I wound up taking a new approach. I combined elements of the top 3 looks into an original character for my yard haunt. I also pulled heavy influence from the Oods on Doctor Who, my favorite creature design of the new series because Lovecraft, that's why.

Watch the episode, then click through for the behind the scenes gossip.

• I have not used a character to direct fog in my yard haunt since the first one I did in high school inspired by The Munsters. I built a papier mache dragon head (Spot!) and hid the fog machine in the bushes. It didn't work at all.
• I'm not joking about how much the challenge confused me. I watched it five times before I changed directions for Sketchy Details @Home.
• I try as hard as I can to do a green haunt. That's why I have all those cardboard boxes and large recyclable containers all over the workshop. They make good forms for papier mache and other projects. The flowers are ripped off of other props or yard sale finds.
• That attitude is why I kept the broken piano bench so long. It worked for drying art/ceramics/props on and then I realized it was the right height and size to hold the fog machine for this prop. Free and recycled are the best supply descriptions.
• That air dry clay will be the death of me. I had elements I cut out of the video because they shattered when I moved them and, as you saw, the face fell apart. Too heavy and fragile to use on its own, but too uneven in drying to use on an armature. I'm switching to PaperClay for the rest of the haunt season.

You can follow all the new Sketchy Details video series at Sketchy Details @YouTube. Tuesdays are pop culture-inspired arts and crafts with Sketchy Details @Home. Thursdays are horror, sci-fi, and fantasy media criticism with Slipstream: The Pulp Culture Vlog. Alternating Saturdays are everything Halloween with The Haunting Ground.

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