CHANGE OF PLANS... good or bad?

If you are planning to still do magic and illusions I would stick with Houdini but if you not feeling it, you need to go with what moves you. and if you don't have much invested yet then change the theme

I thought about it heavily last night and decided to change themes. Plus, Houdini was going to be a bit more than I could chew at the moment.

Cant wait to see what you do with Phantom! What are your plans? Yard Haunt, Costumes, show...? You could also show scenes from the movie on a screen if you have a projector.

PTO has a great aesthetic. Have you seen it on Stage/Movie? Many years ago I recreated the "Music of the Night" scene with tons of candles and a half boat on wheels in the fog. You could also show scenes from the movie on a screen if you have a projector.

I have always wanted to do Wicked's Defying Gravity. At one point in the past I had access to a cherry lift, but no more.

Good luck and always go with what excites you! This is a hobby not work.

I once made a Witch defying Gravity costume. I had one leg in brightly striped leggends,my other leg in flat Black, a phoney leg in the same bright stripped leggends, the phoney leg (pvc pipe and some padding) was on a hinge on a belt around my waist, All dressed in Black, I got everyone's attention then lifted my "brightly colored leg up from the floor, then lifted the phoney leg (on it's hinge) up, so I was standing on one, hidden leg.

As a fan of the book Phantom of the Opera, I can see how magic and illusion would play into a themed haunt VERY WELL on such a theme. Wish I could experience it.

Abunai said:

It's early enough in the season to make a course correction, but I often have to keep the philosophy, below, in mind:

Cheetahs make a great analogy for the value of focusing on a winning strategy. If you’ve ever carefully watched a cheetah go after a gazelle, you’ve noted that the cheetah will pick out one gazelle and start chasing it. The gazelle, being a herd animal, will often run into the herd. In the chase, other gazelles become closer, in fact I’ve seen a cheetah graze against other gazelles, but it keeps chasing the first gazelle. The Cheetah has a strategy, it picks out one gazelle and sticks to that goal no matter how many other “better opportunities” present themselves.
A good marketing plan is based on a good “situation analysis”. If you did a situation analysis for a cheetah, you’d look at its strengths (speed, up to sixty miles per hour) and its weaknesses (it can only run about 500 yards before it literally starts to overheat and has to stop). If it started chasing the nearest gazelle every time one became closer than the “goal”, it would quickly become overheated and go without a meal. The cheetah’s strategy is to concentrate its resources on one and only one gazelle, and with that strategy it survives.

This excerpt is geared toward marketing, but applies equally well to a lot of fields, including haunting.

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This is a killer post! pun intended.

So, I've decided to make a few tutorials for YouTube about the creation of this years haunt. The trailer for the makeup series is on my channel: TheDarkRideBoy . I'll be uploading the mask tutorial later today and filming the first part of the makeup tutorial today.