As a home haunter, it's often difficult to create a complete experience for your patrons with the space constraints of a small backyard or a two car garage. With that in mind, I decided to make a list of ways to make the most of a small space.
At a basic level, there are two ways to maximise a small space: either make smaller rooms (and therefore more rooms), or slow people down so the whole experience takes longer. It would be impossible for me to list every possible way to do these two things, so remember that essentially anything that achieves one or both of these purposes will effectively make your haunt longer (in other words, don't limit yourself to the ideas discussed below)!
Without further ado, here's my list of space-maximising techniques.
Creating Smaller Rooms:
1) Build narrow hallways. Granted, if you want to have wheelchair access, your halls need to be three feet wide or more, but there is absolutely no reason to make halls wider than that. The less space any one scene takes up, the more scenes you can have in total. In my haunt, I rarely have hallways wider than two and a half feet, with my average being right around two.
2) Use 2-dimensional props whenever possible. Let me elaborate on that; with a small space you don't want to lose square footage to large props. But then of course, you can't have a good haunt without props. So how do you meet both of these demands? It's simple; you establish your setting using wall-mounted props. Signs, posters, family photos, cork boards, warnings, windows, tool racks, and even some not-so-thick props can all be hung on walls without cutting into layout space. As a general rule of thumb, think of anything that you can draw onto a blueprint-style layout of your haunt as a space-consumer, something that detracts from the remaining usable space in your haunt, and be sure to carefully consider the necessity of all of these pieces. (But on a side note, make sure you do have something other than just walls in your haunt, otherwise it's just a bunch of hallways. I would never argue for anyone to do this, just to remove the unnecessary and space-wasting set pieces.)
3) Take time to paint and detail your base walls. If you're lucky enough to be able to afford wooden walls, don't waste this powerful scenic opportunity! Going off of my last point, if you can establish a setting using the existing walls rather than by adding set pieces that take up more horizontal space, you will be left with more walking space and therefore a longer haunt.
4) Utilize floor and ceiling space. The top and bottom of any scene are powerful but often overlooked canvases for telling a story. You often may find that you can't do much to the floor of a scene without creating a tripping hazard (but if you are in a permanent space that belongs to you, a simple coat of paint can do wonders); however, one should never forsake the opportunities that ceilings present. Of course, you can install a wooden panel and paint it to your heart's desire, or cover the tops of your walls with cammo netting or erosion cloth, but also remember that putting a prop above people will never cut in to your workable space; essentially, the same few square feet can be used both for scenic elements and as the patrons' path.
Slowing People Down:
1) Scare backwards. It is often said in the haunt industry that scaring people forward (or from behind) is the best way to run a haunt, but this is only true when the purpose is to increase throughput by pushing people through the event faster. Of course, in the world of home haunting, the goal is rather to slow people down and make the overall experience take longer, and arguably the easiest way to do this is to put a monster in people's path.
2) Use the sense of touch. Whenever people have to push their way through any obstacle, be it as simple as hanging fishing line or fabric flaps, or as complex as a claustrophobia tunnel or moving room, they inherently slow down. This comes, I think, largely from the fact that touch is the only major sense (excluding, of course, smell and taste) that isn't preyed upon by other forms of entertainment; after all, movies can desensitize people's eyes and ears, but most people will still have hesitations when it comes to touch.
3) Make lots of twists and turns. By making your guests change direction frequently, you can both hide upcoming scenes so the haunt seems longer and slow down the patrons' pace. People can't run around 90 degree turns in a two-foot-wide hallway, no matter how loud the chainsaw is behind them.
4) Employ fog, darkness, and other disorienting effects to confuse people. When people can't see where they're going, it takes them longer to get there, so whenever you can, be sure to block or at least minimize patrons' line of sight. (These effects can and should also be used to hide a scare, otherwise you're really just killing one bird when you could take two.)
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