The Spider Room- materials?

[zombietoxin]

Hi, my name is Rob- a new guy - and I just posted in Introduce yourself thread. Now, I'm here to chew bubble gum and ask questions! So if you see me poking my head into your thread- just remain calm and DON'T MAKE ANY SUDDEN MOVEMENTS!

So our haunt won't be open until the 2011 season (BOOO!) but that just gives me time to refine, refine, refine.

So.... The Spider Room. I'm going for a totally cocooned look. Well as much as possible including walls, room contents and portions of the ceiling (leaving clearance around the sprinkler heads). There are a few really cool and durable web products out there that can be used in the 'contact' areas, but maybe I'm missing something and thought I would ask for opinions.

Obviously whatever I use will need to be pretty hard/durable so that got me to thinking about what I could put under the finish surface for support and maybe add to the finished look.

At this point, I was thinking about a spray foam base with web materials stuck in/to it. However I just happened to be looking at camo net when the white camo popped into my mind as a possibility...

Anyway, I'd love to hear suggestions!

Thanks -Rob

[Atrox Freak]

Materials

Check out some of Franks stuff at Scare Products. They sell an item called web tex(http://www.onadira.com/cms.Catalog.a...fect_Materials). We used this stuff in our haunt due to the fact of it being open for the sprinklers to function, it also looks really well when back lit. It is fairly durable to deal with and they have a couple of styles to choose from. Hope this helps.

Brian

[RJ Productions]

A while back Knott's did a whole Spider theme haunt. At the end they had a similar room. For the scare they had guys on bungees jump down near the audience. I think they used these:
http://www.studiotekfx.com/slingshot.html

It worked!

[Allen H]

zombie toxin,
There are a ton of options when it comes to making things look cocooned, I have an illicit relationship with beef netting, I love the stuff. I got really good realism from useing several layers of beef netting that is then hit with a thermo plastic webber. Then hit it with some poly urethane spray. I dusted mine with fine glitter because I was going for a stylized look (it looks cool, but not necessary.
I have found that customers dont normally mess with cobwebs to much. Im not quite sure of what you mean by
"whatever I use will need to be pretty hard/durable so that got me to thinking about what I could put under the finish surface for support and maybe add to the finished look."
If you want cocooned victims then I like to use balloons as a base. Then wrap them in duct tape and then fiberglass with two or three layers of cloth, If you segment the fiberglass body then you can animate them pretty easy. then treat the fiberglass form with the beef netting and thermoplastic webbing.
Another option is to use surgical latex dripped in a thin line over a large sheet of glass, pour it into a weblike scribble pattern (think funnel cake) then pull it up once it dries. that makes a flexible sheet of webs to wrap around stuff and has a unique look.
I hope this helps somewhat,
Allen H
Here is my beef net supplier.
http://www.trentonmills.com/beefstockinette.htm

[scarygoat]

I've never been into spider or insect themed rooms, but I really like that idea Allen, with the balloons and fiberglass. You're always thinking outside the box! Allen, what are the dimensions of 1 roll of beef netting?

[Allen H]

they go by weight as opposed to length. I ordered a 20lb roll last year and I dyed it green so I had to hang it to dry, I would say it was easily 400+ ft long, possibly 600ft. It was alot, I did my whole trail with it across every corner overhead in some spots and I still had some left over. Its also very hard to measure as its super stretchy.

[zombietoxin]

Thank you gentlemen.

Yup, webtex was the stuff I was eyeing for the potential contact areas (places where people are likely to either touch or rub up against- hence the foam base idea), but other areas could, in my opinion, be done with much cheaper materials. As for contact areas- I wanted to telegraph the upcoming spider romm to the guests by starting the web around the preceding room's doorway- as if you were heading right into a spider hole. Since doorways are narrower, they pose a rub/touch factor greater than casual prop touching. I wanted to back up the doorway with a short hall to continue the spider hole effect, then on into a more open room area.

I like the beef netting idea... thanks!

The room is a bit irregular because it has the stairs to the second floor. Therefore the scare here must be minimal, although I am looking into bungies for another area. Thats why I chose the spider theme- creeps people out without anything jumping out. I intended to have the spider victim/kicker, numerous medium size spiders with minimum movement and one big-ass spider in the far corner. I haven't decided on the animation for him yet. It depends on the impact on my test subjects- I don't want anyone falling down the stairs.

Thanks again fellas!

[scarygoat]

All right, thanks Allen. Good luck Zombietoxin!

[brad]

Rob, for starters, welcome to the forums. You wil find tons of good info on here.

As far as your scare placement... I would highly advise you to keep the effect away from the stairs. Even if its a minimal scare, its generally a bad idea.

Try to place the scare before the stairs, so that any hysterical patron has a few seconds of down time before they start to go up the stairs.

Just one person that trips or falls down stairs because of a scare can financially ruin an otherwise awesome season.

[danglin]

Spiders

Welcome aboard! Like Brad said, this forum will be very useful to you.

One of our rooms will be a mausaleum room that has been overtaken by spiders, and we bought the static and animated spiders from Dark Raven. Spiders are always a good thing to work into at least one room of your haunt, because so many people have a primal fear of them.

Good luck.

[ClusterOne]

On a similar idea, anyone have any ideas on how to create a cocoon costume? I have a spider room as well this year, and need an actor in a cocoon. But they need to be able to get in and out of it each night, and maybe a way to have a potty break?

-Joel-

[zombietoxin]

hmm... just a brain fart, but how about a white body stocking type undergarment, with a zipper up the back, as a base and maybe use a 3M spray glue like Spray Mount- which is a light weight adhesive and regular store-bought web.

Put the base on your actor and have him turn in place while you alternate spraying adhesive and applying web until you get the look you want?

[Allen H]

Go to a party store and buy two (three foot) latex baloons.
Inflate the baloons and then tape them together.
then wrap the middle (fill in the gap) with saran wrap.
It should be capsule shaped and your actor should be able to fit inside.
Wrap the baloons in stretchy spider webs a thin layer all the way around
then spray over that with a hot glue web gun
repeat layers after five layers of each you should be have a decent thickness
A real good coat of hot glue gun webbing to hold it all together should go on last
Then pop the baloons and pull them out
Make a slit in the back side and the actor should be able to slide in and out
Allen H

[Allen H]

Or use beef netting and fabric stiffy, using the same technique.

[ClusterOne]

Thanks for the ideas, I will give them both a try!

-Joel-