| The Reaper (Kostucha) | The Witch (Baba Jaga) |
|---|
| |
What it does
- A real-time 3D face. The Reaper is a cracked skull in a black hood with fire burning in its eye sockets; the Witch has green warty skin, a long hooked nose and slit cat eyes that blink. Both are raymarched in a WebGL shader with real lights and shadows.
- It listens and talks back. Speech-to-text (Whisper), an LLM that stays in character (Claude, or a fast NVIDIA-hosted model), and a processed demonic or witchy voice with the jaw moving in sync. Polish and English.
- It sees you. With a webcam the head turns toward people, wakes up when someone approaches and dozes off when it's quiet. Frames are analysed on your computer at 64×48 pixels and never stored or sent anywhere.
- It moves like an animatronic. Servo-style head motion (with servo whine), breathing, blinking, nodding while it speaks.
- It scares on cue. Every scare has a hotkey, the monster triggers some on its own, and the AI can pick them mid-conversation.
- Games. Riddles for trick-or-treaters (right answer = candy) and a counter of "souls collected tonight".
- Family mode. Gentler prompt; no blood, screams, exorcist or possession.
Download
The builds are not code-signed yet, so your system will warn you:
- Windows: "Windows protected your PC" → More info → Run anyway.
- macOS: open the app once, then System Settings → Privacy & Security → Open Anyway.
- Linux AppImage:
chmod +x Hauntface-linux-x86_64.AppImage and run it.
Intel Macs: run from source (below).
Setting up your prop
-
Put a screen inside the prop: an old monitor or TV behind a hood or a mask works great. Add a webcam, a microphone and a speaker.
-
Start Hauntface, press H for settings and pick a monster and a language.
-
Give it a brain: under Brain, ears and voice pick a provider and paste one key.
- OpenAI (recommended): one key does everything: the brain, listening (Whisper) and the creepy voice.
- Anthropic Claude: great in character; add an OpenAI key too, so the monster can hear and sound scary.
- NVIDIA: free trial key from build.nvidia.com, fast but weaker Polish; also add an OpenAI key for listening.
The three lights show what's ready (brain, ears, voice), and the mic meter shows the trigger level, which is matched to your room's noise at start.
-
Press Test brain, Test ears and Test voice, then click the screen to wake the monster. F = fullscreen.
The first launch compiles the 3D shaders, which takes 10–20 s on weak integrated GPUs ("Summoning the spirit…"). After that it starts instantly.
For an unattended prop, run it in kiosk mode so it wakes up by itself: Hauntface --kiosk --autostart.
Scary voices (ElevenLabs)
For the creepiest voice, pick Voice → ElevenLabs under Brain, ears and voice and paste an ElevenLabs key (there is a free tier). Click Pick a voice, search the community library in English (demon, witch, monster, creepy old man…), press ▶ to hear a sample and Use to give it to the current monster. The Reaper and the Witch each keep their own voice, and the demonic effect (pitch, distortion, growl, reverb) is layered on top; set its strength under Advanced → Voice.
Hotkeys
| Key | Effect | Key | Effect |
|---|
| S | lunge + scream + shattered screen | P | spiders crawl out of the eye sockets |
| X | exorcist head turn | U | ghosts in the fog |
| L | lightning + thunder | N | wolves howling |
| G | possession glitch | V | cracked screen |
| B | blood tears | J | bell tolls the hour |
| T | twitch | C | teeth chatter |
| W | whisper | R | laugh |
| E | eyes on/off | Z | sleep/wake |
| H | settings | D | debug line |
| F | fullscreen | Space | microphone on/off |
| Esc | stop talking | K | switch monster |
| 1–5 | eye fire colour | A | ambience on/off |
Type a line under "Speak manually" in the settings and the monster says it (puppeteer mode).
Phone remote
Press H → Phone remote → Turn on the remote and scan the QR code with your phone (same Wi-Fi). Your phone becomes a remote: see what visitors said and what the monster answered, type lines for it to say, fire any scare, switch monsters, mute the microphone, or turn off "AI answers by itself" and do all the talking yourself. Nothing leaves your home network; every request needs the secret token from the QR code. The first time, Windows may ask about the firewall: allow private networks.
Privacy
- Camera frames are analysed locally and thrown away.
- Microphone audio is recorded only while someone speaks, and sent only to the speech service you configured. Text goes only to the AI provider you picked. Nothing is stored except the night's visitor counter.
- In the desktop app, API keys are encrypted with your operating system's keychain and the page itself makes no network requests.
- If you set this up at your front door, it's polite to put up a small sign that the monster listens and watches.
Run from source
Desktop app:
cd desktop
npm install
npm start
In a browser (needs a GPU with WebGL2):
python tools/serve.py
Then open http://127.0.0.1:8777/. The small server forwards NVIDIA requests, because NVIDIA's API doesn't accept calls straight from a browser.
Build installers: cd desktop && npm run dist. Releases are built by GitHub Actions when a v* tag is pushed.
Project layout
app/ the face: index.html (shaders), app.js, i18n.js (PL/EN), providers-core.js (LLM/STT/TTS)
desktop/ Electron shell: main.js (keys, AI requests, window), preload.js, build/ (icons, signing)
site/ landing page; build.sh also copies app/ into /demo/
tools/ serve.py — run in a browser from source
Roadmap
License
MIT. Website: hauntface.com. Made for the night of 31 October by bartoszkolo, the maker of Stagelight.
