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ABANDONED DISNEY: Haunted Mansion Hitchhiking Ghosts


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ABANDONED DISNEY: Haunted Mansion Hitchhiking Ghosts

transparent.pngThursday, July 21, 2011 at 10:40PM Posted by transparent.pngAdmin Imagineering-Disney_Haunted-Mansion-HHG-1a.jpg?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1311740680232

Take a look behind-the-scenes of a four-decade favorite that is no longer what it used to be.... Magic Kingdom's Haunted Mansion Hitchhiking Ghosts.

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How it worked

It is no secret that holograms were never used in The Haunted Mansion. Old stage techniques including Pepper's Ghost effects and the use of two-way mirrors are about as low-tech as you can get while still accomplishing jaw-dropping "how'd they do that" illusions.

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You'll notice in the above diagram that the "ghosts" were on a revolving track lined up with the Doombuggies on the opposite side of what look like normal mirrors. Light reflecting off human guests would reflect off the surface of the mirrors. At the same time light shining on the hitchhikers behind the mirrors would be visible through the mirrors, allowing both ghosts and humans to be seen together. Get it? It's like walking by a highly reflective office building and seeing yourself in the windows and seeing electric lights inside the building all at the same time.

The right lighting conditions were needed to pull off the illusion. If the house lights in the room behind the mirrors were to turn on, the mirrors from the other side would look more or less like clear glass.

Disneyland or Magic Kingdom?

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Seen here are two fantastic pics from Long-Forgotten where we learn that Disneyland's Hitchhiking ghosts on the "ghosty-go-round" have no hands. Hands were included in the Magic Kingdom and Tokyo Disneyland versions.

Dark Beards?

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You'll notice the handless Disneyland figures happen to have white hair. And these Magic Kingdom figures have dark hair. They both are supposed to have white hair as to better reflect light through the mirrors. As was mentioned in a previous post, oil, grease, and dust cake the artificial hair of the Haunted Mansion ghosts and the hair becomes far less visible especially in the Ballroom and with the Hitchhiking Ghosts. Occasionally fresh hair could be spotted along side old dingy hair, illustrating the importance of clean, white hair.

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So long, fun illusion that entertained us so well for all those years.

For the time being, we still have Disneyland's low-tech, high-entertaining, original effect:

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I'm looking at these pics and thinking this would be a perfect blog entry for the, mysteriously missing of late, Disco Yeti... just imagine how snarky he could get about abandoned ghosts without hands... *sigh* where is that Yeti anyway??? :-\

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Do they not do this anymore or am I misunderstanding?? I will be really sad if this feature is gone. It was my favorite part of the ride as a child.

Very cool pics!!

It's been replaced with, from what I understand, a much cooler effect.

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>:( What!?! They are gone? I saw they were changing something last time we were there, but I thought they were just refurbishing. has anyone seen the new fangled effect? Is it as good? Why can't things just stay the same..... And where is that Yeti anyway? :dance:
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Another great find, Monique!

I am surprised by how primitive the old effect seems by today's standards. It's pretty remarkable that they came up with it in the first place, and that it lasted as long as it did.

Spoiler Alert- If you want to be surprised by the new effect, don't read the rest of this post.

You will LOVE the new effect, and since it's probably digital and CGI, they will be able to do so many new cool things with it at very little cost!!

I agree!

The new additions to the Haunted Mansion attraction are great.

In the end scene, the hitchhiking ghosts now do a bunch of different things, not just sit in your Doombuggy. For example, if there are two people in the Doombuggy, they can create an effect where your head is switched with the person sitting next to you. Once, when I was riding solo (which happens a lot with a party of three), a ghost plucked off his beard, and put it on me. Fun! And, there are other possible scenarios too. This new addition recreates the old "how did they do that" feel for this attraction.

TCD

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Do they not do this anymore or am I misunderstanding?? I will be really sad if this feature is gone. It was my favorite part of the ride as a child.

>:( What!?! They are gone? I saw they were changing something last time we were there, but I thought they were just refurbishing. has anyone seen the new fangled effect? Is it as good? Why can't things just stay the same..... And where is that Yeti anyway? :dance:

No worries folks!! This article just talks about the old way the effect was created. The technology has been updated, but the ghosts are still there - better than ever from what I've seen recently!

Check out more on the all enhancements to the Haunted Mansion attraction on THIS THREAD.

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