plan for next year.

[hoffie08]

hey i just got done with a home haunt and i was ok. i am 14 and i want to do better next year and i will have about 700 to a $1000. i want to do a evil clown/wild people thing with actors that just go crazy. i am a few props that hang and strobs and fog but i want to go bigger. i dont know what to make the walls out of. i used plastic this year but people could just push it away i want a more think wall that people cant push away. And i dont know what ind of rooms i should have and what kind of props i should have in each of the rooms. the space i have is like 30 feet by 28feet and i am thinking about building a thing in my back yard that will be around 40feet by 70 to 80 feet. i would like to start building props after cristmas so i will have time to build all the props that i will need.
i would love to read all the help you people will write.
thanks
dylan.
p.s. and if someone would like to draw up a plan cause i am bad at using all my space to the best of it i would really like that.

[Scareside]

Walls - I would use wood, just supported 4x8 sheets of plywood usually will do the trick, plus they are more customizable so you can have paintings on them, different wall pattens, ect.

You can get some designs for wall panels here

[hoffie08]

thanks is the the cheapest way to go. or is there one that is cheaper but u can use the wood ones a long time.

[hoffie08]

and does everyone know what place to go to that you can get ideas for clown props.
thanks

[dshaunt]

here is something we did in our clown room that worked well was building a "jack in the box" one actor was hidden inside while another would stand still in the room, they thought he was a dummy and then the box would fly open revealing the other actor...it worked real well.
We made it from some scrap wood left over and just out neon paint on it....

Picture 040.jpg

Picture 015.jpg

[hoffie08]

thanks man that looks cool

[UnDeRTaKer313]

well for over the top..
we had two clowns one had air horn and then we had him jumping off the walls and then in corner we had a clown juggling real machetes it was amazing!

[hoffie08]

o thats cool but idk if i will have a lot of people to have 2 in a room.

[shawnc]

o thats cool but idk if i will have a lot of people to have 2 in a room.

Then that brings up one of the quandaries (spelling?) in putting on a haunt, and especially in doing one on a budget.

Do you have a lot of animatronics (expensive) and few actors, or do you have few animatronics and a lot of actors (also expensive)?

You can always seek out volunteers, but you need to figure out how much you can spend and what you can realistically do with that money.

[hoffie08]

i said how much $ i will have in the first post and i have few actors. so idk what to do.

[Lord Barnabus]

Another way to do wall panels on your cheap budget is to use pallets. You can usually get them for free from places like K-Mart, construction companies, newspaper and printing companies. You can either strip the planks off and build your own panels, or screw the pallets together to form wall panels.

Or check with companies that haul manufactured homes. They use wood panelling to transport the homes, and some of these companies throw away the panels after a home has been moved.

Moving companies like Roger Ward, Red Ball, Allied and others have large wood crates that get beat up over the years. At some point in time they fall apart. You could check with these companies to see if you can have the boxes that fall apart.

[hoffie08]

thanks i will look into that

[hoffie08]

dont the people just see right through it then

[hoffie08]

i am looking for props walls mask so f u have same u want to sell send me pics at dhoff_13@yahoo.com and i will look at them and see if i like the tell me the price u want to sell them for to.
thanks
hoffie08

[Front Yard Fright]

Talk to your friends about helping you out. I started my haunt when i was a freshman in high school and I had some of my friends help out.... Then as time went on and we got bigger we had people contacting us wanting to help out... And this year we had a crew of about 20 people a night and we had a few nights we had to turn people down because we simply just didn't have the space or costumes for that many people.

As far as walls go, there are two ways we do our walls for our haunt. For our outdoor haunt we used plywood with 2x4 frames. For our indoor (Garage) haunt we use OSB with 2x3 frames. OSB is much cheaper than plywood (1/2 the price) however, it doesn't hold up after being in the rain for long. You can get "wafferboard" (A really thin sheet of OSB) for about 4 to 5 bucks. 2x3s run about 1.75 around here. It's relatively cheap, but things do add up!

We've done a clown room for the past 3 years and next year I plan on adding a whole new haunt with a circus/side show/fun house theme to it. Some rooms that I'm planning are a jack-in-the-box room, a monkey cage, hall of mirrors, a "wheel of death" room, and a hallway with tons of doors that they have to find their way out of.

It all comes down to time, money, space, and actors. If we all had plenty of that the world would be a great place.
.

Good luck!