Day 149- "Dr Einstein..I presume.."

Ha! And you thought Einstein was just an astrophysicist! Well he was, but he brought to light the concept of relativity which we use in the haunt realm A LOT! Specifically the concept that motion is something which we can only interpret in our mind as occurring RELATIVE to some other reference frame. For example, those of you who followed us last year know we ran the 'vortex tunnel'. Many people asked us after they went through it: "How did you guys get the bridge to move?" Huh? We didn't have the bridge move, but it was the PERCEPTION by some people that the BRIDGE was moving RELATIVE to the tunnel! Perhaps some people out there ride commuter trains to and from work. At the end of the day you're in the train early waiting to depart. You look out the window next to you and see a train parked literally 1 foot away from you. Suddenly that train departs and starts moving out of the station. For several seconds however you could swear your train was the one moving forward! Again, motion is perceived in the mind relative to another point of reference. There is no such thing as absolute motion. So you see, Einstein was a haunter at heart!
"OK Doc" I can hear some of you ghouls saying to me, "what does all this stuff have to do with your haunt?"
It is what enables us to build an elevator in the garage!

Back to the plans. So we are at the elevator doors. They open. People go inside. We're talking obviously about Zone 2 in the diagram. The area labeled (E) with the asterisk. The doors close. At the back of the elevator you can see a sort of window cut out of the back panel. In the diagram above, this is the wall that has the diagonal hatched lines on there. The elevator is mounted onto a wooden frame that has springs so when people get into it it 'feels' like an elevator. Suddenly there is a weight that drops onto the the top of the elevator causing it to jerk downward. Then a series of wall panels are pulled upward by an elevator operator located in the area 'S' in the diagram or 'service area'. The panels are seen by the guests through the cutout window in the back of the elevator going upward and hence the sensation that the elevator is going down which you now understand because of our relativity discussion earlier!
So this will be quite a task! My thinking here was to link maybe 3 panels with hinges and build a sort of min- version of a garage door. The panels will be pulled up from the floor of the service area (S). Each panel will appear through the cutout window in the elevator right up against it but not too close so as not to actually contact the elevator wall. There will be a second camera in the elevator (Cam 2) which will enable me to activate the various sound effects and light effects. Now guess what ghouls? This is NOT a new idea. Here is an example of one that was attempted. The one we have planned is a variation of that. I'm not sure I have the time to install an actual motor to drive the panels. I hope to use one person to pull the panels up and once the guests leave the elevator they can simply lower them back down into the floor. The plan is to have the elevator 'descend' into the crypt area. When the elevator doors open at the crypt level, the red bar on the right (moving door, remember?)which we had pulled back into zone 4 is now returned to its position as shown in the entrance hall so the guests do not see the hallway they came through! This enhances the perception they are actually in a completely different space!
Stay tuned for the continuation of the simulated walkthrough!