So, you want to build your own home-based haunt and have a little extra fun this Halloween. Well, I've learned a thing or two in the years I've been doing this (usually by making lots of mistakes), so I'll share my wisdom--such as it is--with you.
A THEME
The first thing you should do is decide on a central theme for your haunt. This will make it a whole lot easier to come up with ideas for the different rooms or scenes you'll create. The theme can be anything from aliens landing on your house, to pirates searching for buried treasure, to vampires invading Monday Night Football. Let your imagination go...or do as I do and browse the Internet for ideas. ;-)
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Along with that, it also helps to have a basic storyline to follow from room to room in your haunt. This doesn't need to be anything elaborate. For example, the storyline in my first haunt was: Dr. D'arc is missing, probably taken by a giant mutated prairie dog, so his assistant Glum will have to give tours of the laboratory.
Everything in your haunt should go along with the theme and storyline, down to the treats you hand out. For example, you could give away Mars candybars at an alien-themed haunt. I like to customize my treats, like the "Monster Popcorn" I made for the theater haunt. Often, I also opt for toys instead of food, since the kids get lots of candy at other places, and my haunt is mostly for the experience, not so much for the candy. |
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THE CHARACTERS
Create characters for your haunt. These don't have to be actual actors. They can be absent, and just talked about (like Dr. D'arc in my first haunt), or photographs or video like Professor D'arc in my academic haunt.
For my characters, I also have a central "theme:" the D'arc Family. This is sort of like the Addam's family, but more extensive. I chose this character theme base for several reasons: 1) because my last name is Black, and D'arc is a close approximation of that; 2) I had a professor in college whose name was D'arc, and I always thought Dr. D'arc was a very cool name! (though he wouldn't be amused by my use of his name, I assure you); and 3) with a creepy family as my central base, I can come up with an infinite number of original characters, or characters that twist the usual Halloween cliches.
You can make the visitors to your haunt into participating characters by giving them a hands-on experience. This can be crawling through a tunnel, or shooting ghosts with a laser beam. I think this makes it a lot more fun for them. |
BUDGET
I seldom spend more than about $50 for my haunt, so I'm always on a very tight budget. For big things, like a fog machine and blacklight, I purchase them slowly a year at a time (I got the fog machine one year, the cooler to keep the fog on the ground another year, the blacklight yet another year, etc.)
Most of the time, I try to construct my own elements, sometimes imitating something I've seen for sale in a magazine. I did this with the ghost head I used in the Ghostbusters haunt. I had seen a similar item in a magazine, but had already blown my budget, so I constructed my own head from paper mache and painted it with glow-in-the-dark paint.
So, in order to keep costs low, decide what element you want to try--get ideas from magazines and the Internet--then look around your house and use whatever you already have on hand to try and make the effect. |
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TEST IT OUT
This brings me to another point. For my theater haunt, I tried to construct my own fog machine cooler out of a diaper box. It didn't work at all, but I didn't discover that until about 5 minutes before the first Trick or Treaters arrived. So, if you're constructing a complicated effect like that, try to get it finished a day or so ahead of time so that you can test it. When I made my ghost effect in Ghostbusters, I set it up the night before so that I could see how it looked and make sure it was right.
IMPROVISE
As you play out your haunt, roll with the punches. It won't ever come off exactly as you planned, and each time you take a group through will be different, but that's the joy of live acting. Just try to stay in character and incorporate anything that happens into the theme of the haunt. |
Along with that, you may find that your audience won't react to an effect the way you'd expected them to. In my theater haunt, I found that the ghost made from a broomstick was distinctly unimpressive to guests, so I spiced it up with my acting. When I walked into the room, I pretended not to notice it. Then, I turned around and saw the ghost and hollered in frightened surprise. The ghost didn't scare visitors, but I got them to jump when I acted scared.
DECORATE
Little details make the haunt richer and a funner experience for everyone. An example of this is the rat sandwich my gravedigger was eating in the academic haunt. You can add cutesy little details like this to all of your scenes to enrich the visitors' experience. |
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A word of warning, however. If you've set up a great detailed scene, outside or in, make sure it's lit well enough that viewers can see all of your handywork, including the details. I learned this mistake the hard way.
Now a word about music and lighting. I like to use colored light bulbs for most of my scenes: it gives things a nice other-worldly glow that goes perfect with a Halloween haunt of any theme. I've found that the black light bulbs don't work very well in regular light fixtures, so if you want to do a glowing white effect, you should invest in a blacklight fixture.
Music and sound effects are really important. They can set the whole atmosphere of any scene in your haunt. Don't go for the obnoxious, bludgeon-you-to-death music and screeching sound effects they often sell in the stores. Instead, find subtle music that tugs your visitor's emotions the way you want them to go without being overbearing. And use sound effects to heighten the imagination of your visitors and help them to immerse themselves in the haunt. Several pieces of classical music can be very eerie and add just the right touch, and you can find lots of mp3 sound effects on the Internet to download, often for free. |
MISC.
And, finally, here are some misc. tips:
- Take lots of pictures: of yourself, and all the scenes in your haunt. Do this before visitors come, in the daylight or under normal lights, if possible. Sure, it won't look the same as it did for visitors, but you'll be able to see something besides a blurry image in your photos.
- Keep track of who goes through your haunt, maybe with a guest book. Then you can alert everyone of your plans the next year, and you'll also have a good idea of how many guests to make treats for next time.
- Set operation hours. You can post a sign on the front door with your hours, so that people won't come before you're set up (at least, they can come back when you're ready), and you won't be stuck running people through your haunt later than you want.
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- Skip the gore, unless you plan to let only teenagers and adults in. I don't like to expose kids to the "horror" aspect of Halloween (and I don't care for it much, myself), so I flex my creative muscles to create something unique each year. My haunts can be enjoyed by all ages.
- I like to give everything a humorous twist, especially at the end--like a punchline. Little kids can laugh at their fears--and thus learn to overcome them--when a would-be scary character acts silly.
- Don't forget to pay attention to guest safety. Don't leave electrical cords where people can trip over them, or frighten kids into running through complete darkness. Try and think of all the possible scenarios for what could go wrong, then clean up your haunt to avoid those problems.
- Above all, have fun with it. That's what Halloween is for, after all!
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