25 Days to Go..!

Afternoon,
The fact that there are only 25 days to go before our first live evening became very apparent today. With the clearing up from our weekend gigs and all hire equipment returned, today has been a planning day for some of the final scene layouts and the opportunity to put schedules together for the build at Tulleys Farm. A huge amount of work has already occurred, with marquees in place and containers into the corn field, it is now the job of the Twisted Technicians to make them come alive.
Twisted Maze is well underway and some fairly substantial changes have already happened to the Cellar, but a few more are also planned. This will be the fifth season for the Cellar, so it is due a small facelift and i am sure the changes will be appreciated.
The Hayride is also having a few new tricks put in this year, so watch out for those, i will not reveal the plans just yet. Hell-Ements is also having a small revamp and a new sound track is going to be put together in the coming weeks. So that leaves us with the Creepy Cottage staying as an old favourite with proposals for some new lighting and the Field of Screams....or newly named for 2013 as Woodshock. A twist on the field being the aftermath of a festival, there are some firm favourites being adapted and some new concepts for the field, this is going to be a lot of fun to build.
We are also having a new element this year, live entertainment in the form of a stage area, this will be a first for the site and a huge amount of planning has gone into make this work for this year, logistics, bands, location and access as well as all of the technical requirements.

So i will Leave you with the short trailer for this years event, and post the updates as they happen.

                        

The weather is turning, Autumn is coming and so is Halloween.

Ian

Cellar Visitors

Good Morning, just a short post on the events of yesterday. Our visitors arrived in West Sussex to be greeted by both sunshine and Stuart Beare.

Coffee and refreshments coupled with a very relaxed opportunity for questions and quizzing was to be followed by a guided tour of the haunts that we have at Tulleys Farm and an explanation of the infrastructure and layout.

Imagination is clearly required at this time of the year, as there is very little that is intact and running. Firstly the hayride, with the sun beating down it was a pleasant walk around the route, we explained the designs and bared our souls to some of the tricks that are used throughout this attraction at Halloween. The field of Screams was going to take a lot more imagination though, with the whole field still in its earthen colour it is hard to picture the terror that will ensue in a few months time. the concept was explained and the containers that house some of the permanent fixtures stood rank and file visible to inspect.
Curtains again impossible to recreate at this time of year, but is a concept simple enough in design and location.

The Cellar was waiting though, with a call from our resident makeup artist and creature tamer, it was ready to go. Lights, sound and the gaggle of cellar creatures, we led our guests to a fully functioning attraction. With safety explained and everyone having removed sunglasses and other items that could get lost they set off....

It is a very strange experience, standing listening to the screams from within whilst enjoying the sunshine, this is not a normal thing, it is usually dark, occasionally raining and there is very seldom the luxury of just standing still whilst we are live in October.

The actors were excellent, they were ensuring there was no escape, luckily our acting crew for yesterday were all familiar with the space and used it to the best of their ability and gave a great insight to the intensity that is "The Cellar"

A lights on tour was given and some explanation in to the safety features and procedures that we employ in this attraction, being able to evacuate, quickly and efficiently in any circumstance is of paramount importance.

So what was left, well creepy cottage, not at its best, but Hell-Ements was something that is easy to explain, demonstrate and create some of the experience even at this time of year, clearly it is not the full show, but by introducing the hoods that became so famous last season, a little bit of the show can be recreated.

The reception was excellent and a real pleasure to have the opportunity to showcase with a no pressure atmosphere, a great day. Well done once again to our resident cellar creatures, James Lawson, Sam Jarrett, Harry Bright, Samuel Chamberlain, Anthony James Foruria and makeup artist Alex Vlcek

The Cellar

Good afternoon, a busy couple of days with our twisted technician Hippy. The brief was to bring "The Cellar" back to running order for a visit from our friends at Twinlakes Park in Melton Mowbray....could it be done in a weekend..?? Well the answer was a resounding "Yes"
It is officially fully functioning, however progress was hindered somewhat by the noticeable damage caused by some rodents and possible a few other creatures that have taken up residence over the winter months...!!
The copious amounts of rain that we have had recently has also taken its toll and repairs were necessary to a few of the major operating components, our safety panel that allows for a full evacuation has started to show some signs of wear with the damp air that it lives in, no matter though, with new contactors and switches installed, we fired up......all good....well i say all good, electricity was going where it should, time to find the other issues. Transformers, a few lamps and some swearing and there was light everywhere there should be.

So sound next, this should be the easy part as all the equipment had been removed and serviced over winter, a simple case of re-installing the amp rack, sound card readers a bit of patching and all good to go yeah......because these things always work just like that dont they...??

To be fair it was a fairly straight forward installation and it wasnt long before sound was being delivered to all the relevant zones, we did however experience a slight failing in one of the sound card readers...we both believed this to be unlikely and a few substitutions of different cards found that the Golding Audio system was not the failing at all. Some quick interrogation of the data and command text revealed a coding error, quickly rectified and the success was sweet.

A great installation, and a quick reminder of why we all love this crazy industry so much, Halloween in May....bring it on.!

So it leaves one question to ask....Is "The Cellar" officially the first Halloween attraction to go ready to go live in 2012.? What we need now is a gaggle of zombies...cellar creatures and some thrill seekers..