How to Make an Easy Prop Camcorder

For Halloween, a group of friends needed a easy, quick group costume. The decision was to make a group costume consisting of a host and crew for those shows that drop by a random house and give a person a big novelty check for a large amount of money. A friend dressed up in a business suit and got a novelty check printed for $10,000,000,000. Another person dressed up as a microphone guy. Another person was an unsuspecting home owner.. and of course, they needed a camera person!

A request was the the camcorder be hollow in order to house various objects such as a cellphone and wallet.

This build took me maybe 2 hours tops. Let's get started shall we?

Materials

- Cardboard

-Hot glue

- miscellaneous colored foam (red, yellow, and green)

-bottle caps

-PVC pipes

-PVC adapter

-velcro

-dark felt

-short wooden dowel rod

-masking or duct tape

-paint

When i make props, i always draw a full scale, side view of the object. Also, I draw in the buttons and any other details I want. that way, i can see how big to make it. I can also start chopping up the paper sketch in various parts. It also allows me to figure out the "body" of the build.

So with the sketch, I chopped off the lens, microphone, eyepiece, the battery pack, and the handle.

1. Use the template of the body and cut out your two sides.

2. Then cut out your miscellaneous boxes from each side. You will have to cut out larger cardboard squares out and glue them on the inside of walls of your camcorder.

3. You can start cutting out the top and bottom layers and gluing those in. (pic 2)

4. Also, remember that the camcorder was going to house miscellaneous objects, so i needed to make a little accessible compartment in the back of the camcorder. (Pic 2)

Lens

1. Measure the hight and width of you front and back cardboard panels for the camcorder.

2. for your back panel, you will cut rectangle from near the top. This will allow you to access the hidden compartment inside the camcorder.

3. For your lens, take your PVC pipe and push it into the PVC adapter.

4. Cut out a PVC-sized hole in the front cardboard panel and hot glue the PVC "lens" into the hole.

5. I actually didn't want the hole to be see-through, so i reglued the cardboard circle back into the center of the PVC pipe.

Battery Pack

1. For the battery pack, use your paper template that you chopped off to create two sides.

2.Create a lip for the battery pack, which is where you will attach your velcro.

1. At this time, you should have both your sides, your front lens glued in, and your back side glued in. I actually created a lower "step" on the room of the camcorder to make room for the eye piece.

2. Take your "battery pack" and use some masking tape to create a "hinge" type of mechanism.

3. Glue your velcro to the lip of the battery pack and to its adjoining side.

4. Now use your paper template to make a handle. Glue it in.

5. You can add another piece of cardboard to act as a stabilizer. This just prevents the camcorder from potentially caving in on itself.

Microphone

1. Take your PVC pipe and make a little cardboard box on one end.

2. Cover the PVC pipe with some darker felt. (Pic 1)

Eye Piece

1. Create your eye piece out of cardboard. Create a paper template and use that for it. (pic 2).

2. in order to make the eyepiece swivel, i stuck a dowel rod into the bottom of the eye piece. I Also made a hole on the roof of the camcorder. You can secure the dowel rod inside the body by wrapping a few pieces of foam around the dowel. (pic 3)

3. Once all your pieces of your camcorder are glued in, glue the other side of the camcorder to close it up. (pic 4)

1. I painted the camcorder all black.

2. Add miscellaneous bottle tops and foam pieces to imitate buttons and lights.

3. Since the entire camcorder is black, i added a red strip of foam into the lens.

We went with a generic camera person look so we opted for a vest, a backwards hat, and a fake badge. Don't be afraid to interview strangers on their happiness about receiving a $10,000,000,000 check! LOL. Enjoy!

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