I ran a very successful Haunted House for many years. Each year it got better and better. Why do you think that is? Did it simply get bigger and more elaborate? Actually just the opposite of that. I learned that stripping it down and going back to the basics works better than anything. There was a time when I was obsessed with building Animatronic Props. Elaborate machines that were activated with floor switches or motion sensors seemed like the way to go. There are companies that sell professional quality Animatronic Props like you see in large scale Haunted Houses, but these normally cost hundreds or thousands of dollars. You can actually build these props for a fraction of the cost if you have some basic building skills. The problem with these props are there is too much room for error. The switch can malfunction or the motion sensor doesn't pick up well in the darkness. I ended up spending more time trying to keep these contraptions working than I did Scaring folks. I still from time to time use some of these props but they are normally man powered. You still get the scare factor but it's more reliable with a real person operating it. I decided the last three years I did my Haunted House that I was going to go back to simple designs with live actors. I used just enough atmosphere to set the mood and then the punchline. These were the best years ever and each one got better and drew bigger crowds. I will assume that most of you are like me and on a budget so this helps since you can build a pretty awesome haunt for very little money. When you keep things simple your haunted house will run smoother and you will have more fun. A sure fire plan is dark dreary settings with good music to set people on edge. I like to build sets that let people walk into what seems like an empty room. They know that it's not really empty but they don't know whats going to happen. Now that is fear at it's best. Once you build that anticipation up in people that makes the scare ten times better.
8/17/06
IT'S ALL ABOUT FRIGHT TACTICS!!!
The single greatest part of putting on a haunted house is the scare. To scare the living daylights out of someone is what you work toward from start to finish. I never tried to make money or become famous with my haunted houses, I only wanted to scare people. Adults, children, old and young I love to scare people. Let's pretend that there are two schools of thought when it comes to fright. The first one I call this frightful imagery. This method includes highly detailed scenes that focus on what frightens people, such as Clowns, monsters, characters from horror movies. I call these things a sort of slow fright, there isn't the shock factor involved. You simply expose people to things they are afraid of. For example, alot of people are afraid of clowns. You have a room that is brightly colored with balloons and streamers. The walls are painted some sort of circus theme. As your victims walk past a large jack in the box, a clown pops out of the box. You create the scene to set the mood, then you execute the scare with something that people are generally afraid of.
The second method which happens to be my personal favorite is the shock fest. This method relies on dark eerie scenes with lots of surprises. I have found that if a person doesn't see it coming then they will be even more scared. An example of this would be a dark crypt scene with a person busting out of a coffin. I try to put things in the room that will distract people or draw their attention somewhere else. This way when the real shocker happens they won't be expecting it. The shock effect can be enhanced with sound effects, lights and other props. I like to incorporate alot of darkness with low ceilings, mazes and trick walls. When victims enter a room that seems empty only to have a person in a mask tear out of the wall in a frenzy you get one hundred percent pure terror. I have had people run through the walls in my haunted house trying to get all because of these simple setups. Just about anything that jumps out of a dark corner at someone is guarenteed to scare them. Loud noises, chainsaws, strobe lights, trick walls, two way mirrors and caskets are just a few things to enhance your scare shockers. I have used this method the last three years because it is extremely cheap to build because there are no real elaborate scenes to build and decorate. I don't use animatronics of any kind. I call it going back to the basics, alot of darkness with twists and turns and lots of surprises.
In the past I was obsessed with detail. I loved to build these elaborate scenes with their own sound effects. They looked awesome but they just weren't that scary. I finally decided to focus more on being scary then being something cool to look at. I got some pretty good results with this method. I went from drawing a crowd of around four to five hundred people to drawing about a thousand people. Just remember that however you decide to scare people just stop and ask yourself if you would scare. If you think that you could scare yourself then you will probably effective.
