Halloween Decorations - Scary Decorations, Vintage Decorations, Door Decorations etc
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Halloween Party Decorations
Your Halloween party decorations will probably include the standard range of items, but there are some simple little extra tricks you can easily add that will add a scary surprise, and give your guests a chilling fright and cause a few screams.You will no doubt be planning plenty of carved pumpkin jack-o-lanterns lit with candles placed around your party room, their ghoulish faces gleaming in the subdued lighting. Luminous images of ghosts and ghouls of all description can be bought and hung to glow in the low lighting around the walls of the room. Gossamer cloth or commercial imitation spider web quickly creates a haunted house atmosphere.
Suspending decoration items like bats, flying witches on broom sticks, large hairy spiders, balloons with ghostly faces, skeletons and the like from the ceiling, down to to face level, will have your guests dodging around among these horrors in the flickering candle light, and always on the lookout for their next fright. Distributing plastic spiders and other shocking surprises around where people sit, or on tables among the drinks and plates, will help to keep your guests on edge.
If you hang a number of thin threads from the ceiling in different parts of the room they will not be noticed in the subdued lighting, but will be felt unexpectedly as your guests move around. This can be a surprising sensation, and suggests a ghostly presence that will often get a shrieking reaction from your guests.
Frights come when unexpected things suddenly happen. You could set up a few lights on timers to occasionally briefly illuminate scary scenes or pictures in two or three otherwise dark corners of the room. The effect is increased if you are able to coordinate sound effects to draw attention when the light comes on. Depending on the age group of your guests, you could create a frightening three dimensional scene that is briefly revealed, such as a ghostly headless or hanging man.
Fog machines are readily available from party hire specialists. Used with lighting effects, they will immediately create a chilling and eerie atmosphere in the room as the fog floats across the floor of the room around the feet of your guests. If you can, set up an artificial tombstone or two to conceal the exact location of the machine.
With large screen televisions becoming more common, you could play a horror movie in the background, with the sound turned down, to help to set the scene.
Music plays a large part in creating the atmosphere. At least for the early part of the party, Halloween sound effects and music like the classic Monster Mash will heighten the sense of tension in the room. With the party in full swing later on, your guests will expect to hear their favorite dance music tracks. A compilation interspersing Halloween sound effects would help to maintain the atmosphere.
Halloween Today
The safety of children moving from door-to-door to collect sweets and gifts from strangers in large city communities worries many parents and authorities. In some communities there is supervision and even a move to set up controlled environments where the collection takes place. As a sign of the times, even health issues have been raised about the handling and safety of unwrapped sweets. Charity fund raising involvement has cut back in the face of these concerns becoming more widespread, for example a long running UNICEF fund raising scheme centered on Halloween collections was cut back in 2006.In some parts of the world the trick aspect to Halloween has unfortunately led to vandalism taking the place of minor mischief or witty pranks, and has given Halloween another less attractive image.
For these reasons, the fresh arrival of Halloween as a pop culture fad has been unwelcome in some communities that have not previously shared in the tradition.
The commercialization of Halloween, especially in America, is a twentieth century phenomenon. There is now a large market for Halloween costumes, decorations and entertainment; and the sale of greeting cards, sweets and candies now reaches a distinct peak around Halloween time, only ranking after Christmas and Easter in importance to retailers.
On the one hand the future of the door-to-door trick or treating traditions of Halloween may become confined to safer small community neighborhoods; and the notion of the Halloween trick is being discouraged because of abuse. On the other hand, organized entertainment around the Halloween theme for people of all ages seems to be going from strength to strength. Halloween theme costume parties, both commercially organized and private, have gained in popularity and will no doubt keep the Halloween traditions alive for many years to come.