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Towers Loving Care

Dave said:
The issue isn’t the original intent of the photographer, it’s the fact the film has been digitised.
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They're scanned from negatives (rather than prints) so are true to the original colours from the camera, close enough to be a good impression of what the ride originally looked like to the eye.

Dave said:
The guys behind the lighting of this are from a theatre background
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I'm sure they are capable and I'm not questioning their skills. I also understand its very hard work retrofitting and fixing an old dark ride on a budget.

But, professional theatre knowledge and knowing how bespoke dark ride lighting/scenic effects were made in the 90s, are two slightly different things. We no longer have a busy British dark ride industry that learnt this stuff for years by the time Haunted House opened (and exported to all over Europe). It would take a lot of learning and reverse engineering to get things to a higher standard. If they're trying to be true to the original and enhance it for today, have Alton Towers done technical research on the ride?

Haunted House had a very particular set up originally, which wasn't to create a 'glow in the dark' look but was to allow the original scenery & blacklight tricks to work in darkness. Some of it was simple, some of it was experimental. Such as using custom mixed UV paints by a specialist studio, which gave a different effect to standard flourescent colours. Also UV lighting on large open areas like the garden/swamp had rarely been done - how do you hide the light sources when the car turns to face both directions in an open set? Interesting stuff!

Dave said:
now one thing they might have to contend with is equipment acquired at a price but they will do the best they can with what they have.
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I can't think of any budget reason that would force them to go with UV though? The original blacklight details have mostly since been lost anyway. Any UV paint left in there will probably be from the Duel refurbishment, which did use the cheap flourescent colours. LED UV may brighten & cheapen the scenes even further if theyre not careful, so hopefully theyre on to this?

Perhaps relighting in colour would have been a better result for much less hassle?

Then to find a retro solution for the flying heads. A rapid Woods Glass strobe, with touched up UV paint on the flying heads, would produce a fantastic effect like we havn't seen work for many, many years. If they could restore this, since the glass is difficult to source today, would be very impressed with their skills!

Just being constructive :) Nail this, on a budget, and the ride would be transformed for everyone.
 
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On one hand, it can't really be much worse than it was the last time I visited Alton Towers (2011 - I imagine it has only got worse since). On the other hand, every time one of these "refurbs" happens, it makes it look less knackered (in the short term) but more cheap.

I don't intend to visit in 2018 because Merlin are scumbags so I guess it doesn't matter. I'm just glad BritishThemeParkArchive has done such a good job archiving what made the Haunted House truly special once upon a time.
 
I'm going to post a few suggestions in the sad, pathetic, stupid hope that the TLC guys will at least read them (take them seriously even)

1
Remove the guns

2
Remove the guns

3
Remove the dining table and other clutter in the dining room (in the section between the screaming bust and the 1st giant demon)
It might restore the original effect somewhat.

4
Is there a way to block view of the scare at the end of the trommel until the rider is in range (you can see the scare go off for the rider in front) be it, with a door, spacing the ride cars out or even moving the scare itself! If this can be fixed, then please do!

5
The window zombies,(originally the giants lair) look awful, please replace them with either the giant, those strange monster things they brought in after removing said giant...or anything else, the zombies in this scene just look THAT bad!
Failing this, then at least change the red lights (that flick on when the zombies jump out) to a blue, night like outdoorsy type colour (not purple) to aid the idea that they are smashing through the window from outside the house!

6
Please remove any and all zombies from the hall of spiders, then add in the original hall of spiders music...it will be a vast improvement!

7
If you must keep the guns...then at least, turn off all targets in electric bill's hallway, they really do ruin the whole blackout effect!
Also...with today's technology, have you thought of having a crack at restoring the original flying ghost effect?

8
The screaming hallway is in quite the sad state at the moment, if you can't fix it with the lighting you have available, then you could try experimenting with lasers maybe?
(given the right type of laser light and some clever positioning. You could, in theory, light the models without lighting up the background!)
I don't know a thing about lasers mind you...

9
do not touch the lighting in the garden scene, adding uv/blacklights will only ruin it!

10
The strange basement/secret lab/ ??? Final...it needs to go!

That is all...
 
Doesn't the trommel get fixed every year, just to break gain?

I know that's what happened last year for sure.

I rode Duel quite a few times last season. Start of the season it was pretty bad, You could see quite a few blank walls and mechanisms oh and the blasters were broken Then in the middle of the season it somehow got better and you couldn't see the mechanisms as much (I've assumed they turned the lighting down) and at the end of the season the ride somehow went back to being really bad again but thankfully the blasters were still working.

As previously mentioned the ride will feel quite different this year with just some new lighting, new pre-show and new music, I really hope it pays off, It has potential to be pretty good!
 
Bert2theSpark said:
Doesn't the trommel get fixed every year, just to break gain?

I know that's what happened last year for sure.
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It's very temperamental. A trommel that big can't realistically last 25 years without engineering problems, due to the physics of the turning motion apparently. They could rebuild it, but that would cost da moneys, and the ride has other priorities I fink.

Fun fact, it was the biggest trommel ever built at the time. Hello Towers, please turn off the very tacky skull face at the end because it ruins the tunnel illusion and put back the haze through the tunnel if you can. Would be fab!
 
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Yeah that electric motor, you know the one, and it was made from an old industrial-sized washing machine with wheels off a shopping trolley John Wardley nicked


In seriousness the trommel did work last year when I went in July. It was turned off again soon after apparently. I think it's just to avoid fatiguing the structure after so long. It's a very big bit of engineering.
 
I can see that the Trommel can be temperamental because of the weight of the structure. Maybe the TLC team could look at stripping the tunnel to its framework, and use a textured fabric to create the brickwork effect.



Here is a great example of the effect that could be achieved using a textured fabric, I don't see any reason this couldn't be fitted onto the cylinder of the tunnel, instead of the heavy scenic work that is in use currently
 
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