ABANDONED DISNEY: Haunted Mansion Hitchhiking Ghosts
Thursday, July 21, 2011 at 10:40PM Posted by Admin 
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.
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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Related posts:
The Haunted Mansion Like You've Never Seen It
I Miss Paul Frees
Little Box of Treasures
ABANDONED DISNEY: Country Bear- Max
ABANDONED DISNEY: MK Fantasyland Skyway Tower
If This Doesn't Scare You.....
Pirates of the Caribbean Like You've Never Seen It
Carousel of Progress Like You’ve Never Seen It
Reader Comments (13)
Thank You so much for this awesome post. I am a huge haunted mansion fan as well as disney fan. I really enjoyed this post. I actually got the opportunity to walk around Disneylands haunted mansion while it was closed however i did not go back behind the mirrors. Thank You.
It sucks that we worked there when things were so poorly maintained:(
You can tell the Walt Disney World Haunted Mansion ghost-go-'round figures from Disneyland's by their hands. Disneyland's don't have any.
I do wonder what's become of the WDW figures. Have they already followed somebody home or are they laying on the floor next to Max now.
I believe that the former WDW Haunted Mansion ghost-go-'round figures are slated to be sold at auction, hazardous material innards and all.
You didn't think that Disney was going to give them away, did you?
H.B. Ghost must be on the "inside" :) Asbestos covers the inside of the HM and has yet to be abated. Some folks think that Its a Small World was completely refurbished just to make it look nice again. Wrong. It rained down asbestos 24/7 and had to be taken care of! Same as Mansion and Pirates do today. Even the Jungle Cruise has heavy amounts in the temple scene. I don't want a hitchhiking ghost in my house.
Niether do I, sounds like they take thier grave job way too seriosly.
Has anyone seen how the new one looks? I missed the new ones by a week! We got the stupid projected ones! :P Maybe I should YouTube it!
I bid on these figures at the D23 Expo Auction a few weeks ago. I have a link showing them in the Auction Preview Room: http://www.disneybymark.com/2011/08/28/some-d23-auction-items/
The threesome sold for $38,000.00 – the highest price at the auction!
I rode the Fla Haunted Mansion and saw the new effect a week ago. They've done some amazing visual effects with what they have... HOWEVER, just like the Pepper's ghost trick in the Tower of Terror, they assume they can use cheap flat film/video (instead of animatronics in the reflection) and we won't notice the lack of dimension to these characters. It's a neat effect but the flatness is too tell/tale.
Works well in ads or commercials, but in real life, it's an insult to our stereoscopic vision/depth of field.
Hate the new projections....
Wait, wait ... they no longer end the ride this way??
How do they do the current effects of switching guests heads around? Is it digital now?