A vial of blood from Saw star Tobin Bell -- who plays the villain Jigsaw -- was mixed with red ink and printed on a poster for the next installment in the horror franchise, according to Variety.

Lionsgate also will hold blood drives in conjunction with the Oct. 27 opening of Saw III, as it has for previous openings in the series. The idea was hatched by Lionsgate marketing honcho Tim Palen.

"We decided to do a poster and he's wearing a red cloak. I was talking to the printer and asked what we could do to get the deepest blood red. I asked if it would be possible to use actual blood. There was silence. He said, 'We could try, but are you serious?' I said I was dead serious," Palen said.

Bell also went silent when Palen presented his idea.

"He said, 'That's really weird,'" Palen recalled. But Bell agreed, and a trip to the doctor's office was scheduled.

Printing house Insync Media in Inglewood checked in with the Occupational Safety & Health Administration before agreeing to the idea and learned that everyone involved with printing the poster had to wear gloves and masks.

The posters from the first printing -- about 1,000 in all -- will be sold for $20, minus the first print, which will be auctioned off. All proceeds from the auction and sales will go to the Red Cross.

Saw III was released October 27th, 2006 and stars Tobin Bell, Shawnee Smith, Angus Macfadyen, Bahar Soomekh, Donnie Wahlberg, Dina Meyer, Leigh Whannell, Mpho Koaho. The film is directed by Darren Lynn Bousman.