Building The Stranger Things Lights For Halloween

November 1, 2026 by Zoe Skyforest 3 Comments

When Stranger Things came out all those years ago, one image left an indelible mark on pop culture. A set of Christmas lights, lined up with letters of the alphabet, such that the kid who was barely in the show could blink out messages at Winona Rider from Topsy Turvy Town. [MyEmbeddedStuff] has recreated this cross-dimensional communication system for a fun Halloween project.

The build is basically a Xiao ESP32-S3 microcontroller board and a string of WS2812B addressable RGB LEDs. To keep the Christmas-lights aesthetic, they were actually assembled in place of non-addressable LEDs in a set of existing string lights, with two LEDs per letter of the alphabet for greater brightness adding up to 52 LEDs in total. Because the letters are only lit up one at a time, total current stays low, and power is easily drawn from the power input pin of the ESP32-S3. To control the display, there’s a web server running on the ESP32 which serves up a user interface for typing in messages and having them flash out in sequence, as they did in the show.

Most of the work was in cutting the letters out of EVA foam, but there’s nothing wrong with a quick Halloween arts and crafts project with the kids. It’s a fun decoration that can add a little vibe and curiosity to a Halloween party, so you might consider building something similar yourself next year.

Water Jets Will Carve Your Pumpkin

February 20, 2025 by Zoe Skyforest 8 Comments

Carving pumpkins by hand is hot, sweaty, messy work, and a great way to slice your way into a critical artery. Why not let a water jet do it for you? It’ll be cleaner and more precise to boot, and [Jo_Journey] is here to show us how.

Obviously, you’ll need a water jet machine, there’s no getting around that. You’ll also still have to do the basic preparation of the pumpkin yourself—cutting a porthole into the top and mucking it out is your job. With that done, you must then mount the pumpkin on two metal rods which will be used to mount it in the water jet machine’s working area.

You can then create a vector file of your design, and use your chosen software to generate the G-code to run the water jet. [Jo_Journey] uses Scribe, and recommends cutting at a speed of around 200 in/min at low pressure. Remember, it’s pumpkin you’re cutting, not high-strength steel.

There is some inaccuracy, of course—your pumpkin’s surface is not a flat plane, after all—but the results are good enough for most Halloween-related purposes. Even despite the geometrical issues, though, [Jo_Journey] shows us that you can get pleasantly sharp edges on your design. That’s very hard to achieve by hand!

We do love a good holiday hack around these parts, even if it’s out of season. If you’ve been cooking up your own pumpkinous plans, don’t hesitate to let us know! Earlier is sometimes better—after all, who has time to hack together a project if you’ve just read about it on October 29?

Start Your Creepy Jack-O-Lantern Project Early This Year With Gourdan

May 2, 2024 by Zoe Skyforest 1 Comment

For a lot of us, projects take time, and they have to be squeezed in around the regular chores of real life. Thus, if you’re starting your Halloween builds after the holiday displays have already hit the stores, you’re probably too late. We’re here to implore you to start building early this year—and you can take inspiration from a great pumpkin called Gourdan.

Gourdan is the work of [Braden Sunwold]. It’s a pumpkin with a fearsome visage and creepy eyes that follow you around the room. This is achieved thanks to a Raspberry Pi 3 nestled within Gourdan’s gourdy body. Gourdan’s eyes are a pair of 1.54-inch LCDs which display animated eyes. Thus, no mechanical wizardry is required here—it’s all done digitally. A camera attached to the Raspberry Pi tracks people with the aid of OpenCV, and the eyes are created and animated with the help of Adafruit example code.

There’s never a better time to start hacking for Halloween than right now. And hey, who knows—your neighbour might have kicked off in January, so they’ll have an almighty head start. They could have something really impressive in the works!

And don’t forget—you can always send us your holiday hacks, whatever the time of year! Just hit up the tipsline. Happy making!

Realistic Animatronic Eyes Are An Easy DIY Build

February 15, 2023 by Zoe Skyforest 12 Comments

It’s not Halloween yet, but if you’re planning a technically-complicated costume, it might serve you well to start building now. To that end, here’s a guide from [Ikkalebob] on how to produce a compact animatronic eye mechanism.

The eye is inspired by mechanisms used in professional animatronics. However, that doesn’t mean it’s hard to build. Complex machining is done away with in favor of readily reproducible 3D-printed components. The eyes are able to look in different directions and can move realistically, and the build includes working eyelids that have a great blinking action to them that feels very natural. An Arduino Uno is charged with running the eyes, paired with a bunch of hobby servos and an Adafruit PCA9685 servo driver. A hefty 5V, 4 amp power supply is on hand to deliver enough juice so the servos move smoothly without stuttering.

It’s the kind of thing that’s perfect for your spooky familiar, or installing eyes in the back of your head. It would be perfect to hide behind a window or in the bushes, too. Video after the break.

Continue reading “Realistic Animatronic Eyes Are An Easy DIY Build” →

LED Christmas Lights Optimized For Max Twinkleage

December 21, 2022 by Zoe Skyforest 12 Comments

Old-school filament-based Christmas lights used to be available in twinkling form. LEDs, with their hard-on and hard-off nature, aren’t naturally predisposed to such behavior. To rectify this, some time ago, [Mark Kriegsman] built an Arduino program that makes LEDs twinkle beautifully.

The program is known as TwinkleFOX, and relies on the popular FastLED library for addressable LEDs. [Mark’s] demo setup is built around using WS2811 LEDs, put together in a string with plastic diffusers on each bulb. The Arduino is programmed to vary the brightness of each LED according to a triangle wave function. To create the twinkling effect, each LED has its own unique clock signal, so they vary in brightness at different times and at different rates.

Using an Arduino Uno or Leonardo, [Mark] reports its possible to twinkle 300 individual LEDs at a rate of over 50 updates a second. Using a faster microcontroller should net reliable performance with longer strings. Meanwhile, if you’re wondering how the older-style lights used to twinkle, we’ve covered that before too. Video after the break.

Continue reading “LED Christmas Lights Optimized For Max Twinkleage” →

Spooky, Scary Skeleton Is Pi Pico Powered

October 13, 2022 by Zoe Skyforest 2 Comments

It’s the spookiest time of year once again, and hackers across the globe are cobbling together some spine-chilling projects. [Kevin] is amongst them, and has created a spooky, scary skeleton just in time for Halloween.

The project works in a relatively simple fashion: essentially, a Raspberry Pi Pico is charged with reading an HC-SR04 ultrasonic rangefinder. It’s all wrapped up in a 3D-printed skull-like housing. When the skeleton detects someone or something close in front, the Pi triggers a small servo hooked up to a 3D-printed gear. This interfaces with a pair of racks which drive the skull’s eyebrows up and down, and opens and shuts its jaw.

Of course, there are some major anatomical problems here. Skulls don’t have eyebrows; that’s just not possible. Eyebrows are hair attached to flesh and muscle; they simply don’t exist in the world of bone. However, it’s fair to say [Kevin]’s taking creative license for the sake of the holiday, and we can all support that.

This is a basic build, and a fun one. It would be an excellent way to learn some basic microcontroller skills, while also serving as a great little Halloween charm to scare guests going back to the fridge for another beverage.

We get a cavalcade of quality holiday hacks every year around this time. This year should be no exception – so get your spooktacular hacks into the tips line, post-haste! Video after the break.

Continue reading “Spooky, Scary Skeleton Is Pi Pico Powered” →

Halloween Mirror Offers A Mighty Fright

August 16, 2022 by Zoe Skyforest 22 Comments

Jump scares are controversial in the horror world, whether you’re talking about movies or video games. You can bring that same irritating thrill into real life, too, with this Halloween mirror from [jasonwinfieldnz].

During the day, or simply when it’s bright inside, the mirror appears normal, like any other. However, behind the special two-way mirrored glass surface is a spooky 3D print, such as a skull or an annoying yellow cartoon character. When the lighting level gets low, everything changes. A light-dependent resistor hooked up to a Digispark detects the change, and then fires up some 5V LEDs to light the scary image, revealing it behind the mirror. Even better, it plays a loud screaming sound with the help of a DFplayer MP3 module.

We’d love to see the concept taken even further, too. It would be quite something if, when a passer-by approached, the room lights suddenly cut out and the mirror activated in its full glory.

We’ve seen some great Halloween builds over the years. If you’re eager to get one out this season, you might wanna get hacking now! Video after the break.

Continue reading “Halloween Mirror Offers A Mighty Fright” →