# Wanna See Something Scary?



## RandalB (Jun 8, 2009)

Then tell me what scared you!

I am working on our local charity haunted house and have a couple of rooms that need ideas. I figured I'd come to the experts and see what comes up. 

What scared you in a haunted house as a kid or adult? What makes your hair stand up or creeps you out? What's the creepiest thing you've ever seen on TV or in a movie?

If we run with your idea, I'll post some pics so you can LMK if it does your idea justice...

RandalB


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## QueenRuby2002 (Oct 23, 2011)

Believe it or not it's clowns for me. But not scary clowns like at most haunts. They don't bother my its the happy circus clowns or kids partty clowns where their way to happy and in your personal space trying to get you to laugh or give you a balloow animal. those guys are scarier then the evil looking dingy or bloody clowns any day in my book. also not scary to the point of making me cry or anything but at hauntcon when the haunt I was at seperated me from my group and got me lost in a maze by my self put me on edge. done right this is a good set up for scares if you got the right actors. The first haunt that did thid to me (yes it happened twice that weekend) the actors wernt that scary and I was more annoyed at being lost so I just started asking them which way was out. To their credit they stayed in charicter. The second time this happened they were able to get me with one of the guys hiding in the maze of sheets before I was able to find another group in the maze and follow them out.


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## Pumpkin5 (Aug 8, 2010)

:jol:The only thing that scares me at a haunted house, is being alone in the dark, no giggling friends, no hands to hold, just me alone in complete and utter darkness....that is the only thing that spooks me in the least.....


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## graveyardmaster (May 14, 2012)

Pumpkin5 said:


> :jol:The only thing that scares me at a haunted house, is being alone in the dark, no giggling friends, no hands to hold, just me alone in complete and utter darkness....that is the only thing that spooks me in the least.....


ohhhh you pumpkin5,you said nothing scares you huh.....well i must admit i would love to go to a haunted house,i get a buzz out of things like that,nothing scares me,its the living that can hurt you not the dead...


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## remylass (Sep 18, 2008)

Something that scares me, though I've never seen it in a haunted house.....

I am terrified of looking out of a window at night and having a face appear. I don't know where it came from, but I HATE looking out the window to check out a noise at night! It isn't the, it scares me and is fun kind of scared. It is the, if-a-face-appears-while-I-am-looking-out-here, I-will-die kind of scared.


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## Spooky1 (Aug 25, 2008)

Spiders and the feeling of walking through a web in the dark creep me out.


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## MapThePlanet (Nov 12, 2010)

I'm with Pumpkin5, isolation in the unknown.


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## H3Tank (Sep 19, 2011)

As kid (6th grade) I recall going to a Haunted House in an old Funeral Home. The scariest room I recall was one of a funeral viewing (Wake) where the body came alive and went after the people. I couldn't get behind my Dad quick enough.


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## autumnghost (Sep 12, 2009)

QueenRuby2002 said:


> Believe it or not it's clowns for me. But not scary clowns like at most haunts. They don't bother my its the happy circus clowns or kids partty clowns where their way to happy and in your personal space trying to get you to laugh or give you a balloow animal. those guys are scarier then the evil looking dingy or bloody clowns any day in my book. also not scary to the point of making me cry or anything but at hauntcon when the haunt I was at seperated me from my group and got me lost in a maze by my self put me on edge. done right this is a good set up for scares if you got the right actors. The first haunt that did thid to me (yes it happened twice that weekend) the actors wernt that scary and I was more annoyed at being lost so I just started asking them which way was out. To their credit they stayed in charicter. The second time this happened they were able to get me with one of the guys hiding in the maze of sheets before I was able to find another group in the maze and follow them out.


Oh yeah. Any kinds of clown does me in.


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## MommaMoose (May 15, 2010)

Knowing someone is following you but you don't see them. You hear them, feel them brush by but don't ever see them. Just sends chills down my back thinking about it.


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## scareme (Aug 29, 2006)

Everything scares me. The dark, people jumping out, people in masks. I'm a coward in haunted houses. Maybe that's why I chose the name "scareme". Cause everything scares me. I think the scariest thing in a haunted house was a little girl, dressed like a doll. She followed us around the whole house, not saying a word. I talked to her, she didn't say a word. I offered her money to leave us alone, she never said a word. She just stared at us, in her little ruffled dress, white ankle socks with patent leather shoes, and clutching her little chain saw. Creepy!


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## Dr. Sonya (Aug 3, 2012)

MommaMoose said:


> Knowing someone is following you but you don't see them. You hear them, feel them brush by but don't ever see them. Just sends chills down my back thinking about it.


The only thing is when it is actors or real people, it's not that scary. You just keep thinking, "Oh, they were payed good money to do this". You can never go wrong with sensor pop-outs. I always feel the more fake, the better, just because you feel as if they could come to life at any moment. (Even though they won't, but still, the thought of it )


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## BioHazardCustoms (Aug 5, 2009)

Nothing in a Haunted House. I've been helping with building them and working in them for 13 years. Airplanes? totally different story.


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## corey872 (Jan 10, 2010)

Ya, that is one thing I struggle with too. If an actor 'pops out' in a haunted house, that might be good for a startle...but being chased - my mind is saying 'OK, I paid to be here, they're paid to do that...I don't want to be the dick standing around saying 'not scary' ...'not scary'... but do I really feel my life is in danger...no.

As far as the 'creepy' part, I guess coming out of a room with a lot of excitement...noises, screams, strobe lights, fog hissing, etc...and going into one which is nearly silent always gives me the creeps. I guess in that instance...with all the excitement of one room, if one more thing pops out, not that big of a deal. But when the room is dead silent/still and something goes 'boom' it's a bit more startling.


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

One of the creepiest things I ever saw was in an episode of X-Flies ("Squeeze") where there was a guy, Eugene Victor Tooms, who could elongate his entire body so he could go through small spaces like ventilation systems (we called him "Stretchy Man"). A real actor couldn't do that but it might be something that could be done with a projection of some kind.


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## Lord Homicide (May 11, 2012)

- Walking steel beams 2 stories or higher
- being close to a ledge 2 stories or higher with nothing to lean on


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## debbie5 (Mar 2, 2007)

not that you can do this in your haunt, but walking on a clear/see-thru, elevated floor freaks me out...my lizard brain will NOT stop being petrified no matter how much logic I put in to it.

Some of the most effective scares are the cheapest...putting a piece of rabbit slightly stuffed fur on a handrail in darkened section where the floor is ramped at an angle...making walls of black plastic with a fan running in the room (to make walls move) and having an actor jump out from behind the plastic wall....having stuff come at you FROM ABOVE....making a room that slowly gets smaller & smaller & only exit out is a small 4 foot high door...forcing people to put their hand in a "blind box" where they cannot see what is inside, and making this the only way to release a latch to get out (it wouldn't REALLY be the only way out..actor would spring open the door when hand went in box..)


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## Troll Wizard (May 3, 2012)

remylass said:


> Something that scares me, though I've never seen it in a haunted house.....
> 
> I am terrified of looking out of a window at night and having a face appear. I don't know where it came from, but I HATE looking out the window to check out a noise at night! It isn't the, it scares me and is fun kind of scared. It is the, if-a-face-appears-while-I-am-looking-out-here, I-will-die kind of scared.


That happened to me once when I was young. Living out in the country you can think of all kind of things that could scare you, but I did look out my bedroom window one night. My room was on the ground level and I thought I heard something outside, cause we were always having someone come into the area where I lived and try to steal something.

But I looked out and there it was this guy's face staring right back at me, his face up against the window look right at me! I yelled for my Dad and the guy took off. The sheriff came out and they caught the guy cause he was dumb enough to crawl under a car trying to hide.


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## DrUnK3n_PaNdA (Sep 17, 2009)

RoxyBlue said:


> One of the creepiest things I ever saw was in an episode of X-Flies ("Squeeze") where there was a guy, Eugene Victor Tooms, who could elongate his entire body so he could go through small spaces like ventilation systems (we called him "Stretchy Man"). A real actor couldn't do that but it might be something that could be done with a projection of some kind.


What makes the episode even creepier (Or perhaps it was the followup episode Tooms) is the fact that the actor playing Tooms seems like a bit of an odd guy. He insisted on actually being naked in the scene where he chases Mulder through the tunnel... Which made David Duchovny extremely uncomfortable needless to say. That's quite genuine panic on his face.

Anyway, for me... it's always been mirrors that scare me. I don't know what it is, but at night when I walk through a room with one I always have to keep my head averted. I don't want to look into one and see something behind me... or worse see a different face looking back.


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## remylass (Sep 18, 2008)

Troll Wizard said:


> That happened to me once when I was young. Living out in the country you can think of all kind of things that could scare you, but I did look out my bedroom window one night. My room was on the ground level and I thought I heard something outside, cause we were always having someone come into the area where I lived and try to steal something.
> 
> But I looked out and there it was this guy's face staring right back at me, his face up against the window look right at me! I yelled for my Dad and the guy took off. The sheriff came out and they caught the guy cause he was dumb enough to crawl under a car trying to hide.


Yep. This would scare me to death!


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## Haunted Spider (Sep 6, 2010)

I think the OP was looking for ideas that could be implimented in a haunt. I worked in enough that an actor might startle me if he is good enough but I don't get scared by any of the scenes no matter what they are. But patrons at my haunts always got scared whether they said it or not in a door room. A door room is a room with at least 12 doors on the walls. Some are locked, some open to a small space, or a monster. Some lead to a corridor where they come right back into the same room. One leads out. The hesitation as to which to pick shows the fear and the fun of the room. I used to work that room and it was my favorite. Leave a door slightly open like the last group used that way out and it will be the first one picked every time, with you behind it to have some fun.


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## Dark Angel 27 (Sep 11, 2008)

I don't go into haunted houses very often, but the effect that's always scared me is having to walk on a thin bridge throuh a moving tunnel. I was frozen to the spot and had to be dragged by co worker out of the room.


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## TheHauntedTunnel (Aug 5, 2012)

I am not sure if this is posted already (you have some fantastic replies!) but I know when My senses are overloaded it freaks me out...ie loud scary music, limitied vision and TONS of strobe lights, and things i can't see touching me (like spider webs or hanging creepy cloth).

My sister on the other hand hates it when she can't see anything!


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## ds6191 (Sep 28, 2006)

Pitch black,large room. So you have no clue where you are going. Am I lost?Am I going the right way? Where is my group that I came in with? A soundtrack of whispers works well,or exact opposite,very loud music.Both work well. The imagination goes wild. In a pinch I will use a room like this and it works pretty good.


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## Rich B (Oct 6, 2005)

as a Kid I will always remember the first time I was in a dot room with strobes, the walls were covered in black curtains kinda loose fitting covered in colored dots, and someone was hiding in the corner all dressed in black with dots on them as well and just started walking out towards us, totally freaked me out, especially with the strobes!!! That would be easy to replicate, and very bright LED strobes are available now which you would NOT have to worry about bulbs burining out and needing to be replaced, they have UV (black light) LED lights as well now which can be set to strobe, would make the dots pop out even more if they were flourescent colors!


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## Rich B (Oct 6, 2005)

ds6191 said:


> Pitch black,large room. So you have no clue where you are going. Am I lost?Am I going the right way? Where is my group that I came in with? A soundtrack of whispers works well,or exact opposite,very loud music.Both work well. The imagination goes wild. In a pinch I will use a room like this and it works pretty good.


good call on the whispers! Poison props has an evil whispers CD which works great for this effect, someone had a surround sound (5.1) whisper file posted which is amazing with speakers in all 4 corners


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## Chipper (Nov 2, 2012)

*2*

Two things come to mind:

A long, long time ago........I attended an amazing haunt in Bossier City, Louisiana. I vividly (and this was a long time ago, mind you) recall entering a rather large room, and that room was almost completely filled up with a large cage. Inside that cage was a psychotic gorilla. Of course, you had to inch your way around the outer perimeter between the cage/wall just behind you and the gorilla was only inches away. Doesn't sound like much when written, but it's a classic when staged properly.

Also, a new thing I've noticed that scares me is when I enter a room (that's moderately lit) and there's a moving monster suspended above our heads.....like on a horizontal cable, or something. When done properly, that can be very unnerving. So many haunts today, don't properly employ silence and suspense in a meanigful way.


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## sister (Jul 24, 2012)

I don't really get scared at haunted houses but I do get impressed. 
Something that strikes me as creepy are things that aren't quite right or they are the opposite of what they are suppose to be. (if that makes sense?) - Psychological stuff. 

It's late and I'm getting tired so I'm probably going to describe this badly but we attended a haunt whose theme was an insane asylum where the insane had gotten loose. In one scene, there were 2 *very* good actresses. 1 was the escapee and the other was the attendant. The attendant was bound in a straight jacket. She was moaning and pleading for help but she did it as though she had been through quite a lot before we got there and was very exhausted. The escapee (hair all disheveled, still in her hospital gown etc) told us "Don't listen to her - she's crazy she's crazy". She kept repeating that and she spoke quickly and every now and then, suddenly she'd jerk her head to one side as though she had a muscle spasm or something. That was about 5 years or so ago and it's stuck in my head ever since.


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