This project came about after looking with envious eyes at Eyes In The Bushes (external link) I wanted to do something similar, the large ping-pong-ball glowing evil eyes - but I had a couple of problems. One was the whole wiring and LED thing gave me the shivers, the other was the Eyes were just that, "eyes" which would work quite well for a dark area or under the stairs but in my case I wanted them as part of the street scene and I have these nice well groomed bushes with large empty spaces between them (see picture below) so I wanted something that looked a bit more like a "creature" when people drove by during the day and was tough enough to stay outside in the rain/sprinklers/etc. But still had the big bright eyes at night. As it turned out, this worked quite well and was quick and easy to make.
Thus was born the "Glowing Eye Critter" (GEC)
To build the GEC you will need:
This image shows a unblemished bucket on the left, and what I did to it on the right. I used a skill-saw to cut off the bottom couple of inches and a 3/4" drill to cut the eye-holes
This image shows the complex wiring scheme before attaching it to the body. Basically I use a night-light connected to a extension cord. The night-light sits up on a spray can lid to position the light behind the holes.
Now we have the finished wiring scheme, carefully duct-taped to the inside of the bucket so when it is all turned over the light will stay in place. Although not shown in the picture, I tried the eyes out in the darkened garage and they weren't bright enough - so I replaced the 4watt bulb with a 15 watt one - kind of long and skinny, its used in our chandelier but works great in the GEC as well. I tested the heat output of the 15watt bulb and everything was fine even hours later.
I found some orange ping-pong balls and purchased them. I cut them in half using a pair of scissors - easier than you think if you cut right along the seam. Then I hot-glued the half-balls over the holes.
Finally a little work with a black marker and the eyes looked pretty good!
It's usable as a prop right now but looks pretty plain. I wanted it to be weird looking, something that would attract a second glance if spotted in the daylight. I decided to use some expando-foam on it, that would give the proper "weird" look and then glue on some hair later to keep it from looking to plastic...
By covering the eye-balls with some old spray-paint lids I could spray foam all over the GEC and not have to worry about the eyes getting covered, it also makes a nice eye-socket. Unfortunately the plastic vinyl bucket I used didn't allow the foam to stick to it, notice the sides where it had fallen to the ground. Still with a whole can of foam I was able to make it look decent!
After the foam is dry, I spray painted it a chocolate brown, then removed the paint can lids. You can see where they were. This area is painted black. I also dry-brushed a little black around the body. Actually what I did was take a napkin, dip it in the black and kind of "blob" it around, but "dry-brushing" sounds more professional...
And you can see the result. Ready to scare people with their glowing eyes.... But there is still more!
The finishing touch, to keep it from looking like just another "prop", was to add some hair. That way, people will dismiss it as a dog or something until they take a second look or see the glowing eyes. Hair can be added really easily, in my case I found a witches hat with silvery-grey hair attached for $2, so I purchased it, cut off the hair and threw the hat into the "parts" bin.
As you can see from the picture, I took small wads of hair and hot-glued them all over the GEC. Then I trimmed the hair to not be too long, "teased" it so it spread out and the mighty GEC is finished!
During the day it looks like a dog or some bizarre thingie, but during the night the lighted eyes glow with evil promise!