Best prop response I got this year

[ravensmoon]

So this was our first year doing this professionally. I had an idea for something completely different from anything I had seen before (I live in the LA are and have been to Knott's, Universal and the QM several times in the last 30 years so I have seen a lot) and came up with something that freaked out those who have height phobia's. I designed a bottomless pit that you have to walk over. To make it worse I added a laser switch that turned on the effect just as you were taking your first step into space (I was also going to add about a 3" drop in elevation at the beginning edge as part of the effect but thought it might be too much for some to handle after testing it out on a few people)

While I was building it, I even had an "oh Sh*t" moment when I leaned over it the first time (yeah I'm one of those people who HATES heights) My stomach actually dropped.

pit.jpg

So it worked... It was the biggest response I got and many people even refused to walk across it. We had to end up stationing a live monster behind them to get people to walk across the damn thing... the whole time they were freaking out screaming. my security people would just stand there watching and laugh all night long.

I placed 2 of them in a row(with about 5 feet of "normal" walkway between them) and the on the second one I fabricated a way for a live monster to spring out underneath your feet while you were walking across, nothing like getting people a second time with the same effect!

So my question for the off season is whether or not anyone on here would want one built for their haunt? Obviously price is a factor in anything we do but I wanted to get an idea of what people thought and I could look into what it would cost to make one that is transportable for shipping/storage etc.

thanks for the input
Brandon

[BrotherMysterio]

We did something like that this last October, and it worked out great! Definitely want to do more like that.

C.

[tonguesandwich]

I think about 1 n 3 haunts I've been to have one. My fav was one that you had to crawl out a window and then you were on the ledge of a building looking down .. Which was a bottomless pit. People tried to slide on the ledge but eventually fell.

[BrotherMysterio]

I think about 1 n 3 haunts I've been to have one. My fav was one that you had to crawl out a window and then you were on the ledge of a building looking down .. Which was a bottomless pit. People tried to slide on the ledge but eventually fell.

And where did you see this?

C.

[captpete]

Did you use plexi glass for the top and actually walk on it? How do you keep it clean?
Thanks, Pete

[BrotherMysterio]

Did you use plexi glass for the top and actually walk on it? How do you keep it clean?
Thanks, Pete

Probably not an issue in dim lighting.

C.

[captpete]

I was going to build a grated bridge that you walk on over the bottomless pit. We are inside and outside haunt, so there is a lot of debris tracked through.
Probably not as big of a concern on an inside only. I was thinking the grating would allow a view through, and keep debris off the top mirror. You wouldn't need as strong of plexi either.

Pete

[Jim Warfield]

I put thinner, cheaper plexiglass over the thicker stuff, thinking I would be cleaning the thinner stuff or replacing it if it got too scuffed up, but then I got too busy to even remember to check this. I spent years building mine and it only impressed maybe one of 30 who walked over it, not dynamic enough lighting, I guess? (But then my design was a little different) There are numerous "Shutters" hiding the pit which are manully controlled via a large lever as the lighting changes showing the pit.
I spent 20 minutes sewing up a monster arm/claw and it terrorized a great number of people regularly. You never "know?' 20 minutes versus three years. Maybe I will get a minor modification done on the pit and make it work better?
I know that even if this display works very good, that for what it is will still pale by comparison to what happens to the human sensations elsewhere within my house... in the Bad Dream bedroom.

[ravensmoon]

Did you use plexi glass for the top and actually walk on it? How do you keep it clean?
Thanks, Pete

Yes I used 3/4 inch plexiglass as the floor.

dust and scratches were a huge concern I had at the beginning. There was a dark, pitch black in fact, hallway you were walking down when approaching it which adds anticipation to what might happen. We put indoor/outdoor carpeting on the floor (which we had to fire proof) but that cleaned most of the dust and crap off of their feet. We would then just use one of those large dust mops every night before we opened.

The change in light from pitch black to bright light in your face and the fact of where their eyes were focusing on (the bottom of the pit) really made it irrelevant how dirty it got. I was amazed at the end of the night how dusty it would look when all the lights were turned on, but you really didn't notice it when the effect was working. I was half expecting to have to polish the thing once a week to get scratches out from high heels, but it never presented any problems either.

[ravensmoon]

I was going to build a grated bridge that you walk on over the bottomless pit. We are inside and outside haunt, so there is a lot of debris tracked through.
Probably not as big of a concern on an inside only. I was thinking the grating would allow a view through, and keep debris off the top mirror. You wouldn't need as strong of plexi either.

Pete

If I were you, I'd put it inside towards the middle or end of your inside portion, that way most of the tracked debris would have already fallen off. I used some carpeting on the floor leading up to it which also helped with the dust.

The problem with the grate is that you will still have the debris and dust fall through the grate anyways and be seen just as much as if they were standing on the plexy, but more importantly they will just be standing on the grate, and loose the "leap of faith moment" and adrenaline rush when they step off into open space. We originally had a monster stationed in the corner right behind them to just keep people going. This ended up turning to be a location that all the monsters fought over because it was such an easy scare. EVERYONE was so distracted that they had no idea someone was 12 inches from their face. So they got it whether they were afraid of heights and refusing to walk or just trying to figure out what the hell was going on and whether or not it was real. It was the best distraction effect by far.