Digital Puppets available for the new Apple TV

We're pleased to announce that we have released our puppets for Apple's new AppleTV platform.

The app is called "TV Puppets"; search for it on the AppleTV App Store, and you should be able to find it.

Our puppets are normally $15, but for this introductory period, they're 33% off - $10 each.  If you get your hands on a new Apple TV, be sure to pick them up!

The puppets are slightly different than our desktop models in a few ways.

• First, they use accelerometer controls from the remote to produce much more natural motion.  The motion is much smoother and more lifelike than the desktop controls because they mimic the motion of the remote.
• They have fewer options.  Outside of the accelerometer, the remote is not as capable of capturing puppeteering intent, so we've simplified the puppets significantly for this type of presentation.  For instance, the Magic Mirror doesn't have multiple moods.
• Because we don't control the unlocking of software when delivering through Apple's store, we cannot extend our policy of a software key purchased for, say, Yorick, to the AppleTV version of Yorick.  And vice versa.  Sorry.  We hope the convenience of using the puppet on the television will make up for this!

Enjoy, and Happy Haunting tomorrow!

Codesigned versions of puppets up

Just a maintenance update.  I've put up "code signed" versions of the OS X versions of Mirror Mirror, Yorick, and Gordo on the web site.  This is to address the issue of the dialog box that appears when you launch the puppet and OS X warns you that it is from an untrusted developer.  (I guess that means I'm now a trusted developer!)

The versions are exactly the same as the previous versions otherwise.  If you already have them working in your environment, there is no need to update unless you want to suppress that dialog box from appearing.

Yorick at the Playboy Mansion

We just got a note from one of our customers who used our Yorick puppet to create a fun attraction at a party at the Playboy Mansion:

Sometimes, I think our digital puppets have more fun than we do.

New versions of puppets released!

For those of you who don't know yet, we've released new versions of our Halloween-themed puppets (all except Frosty) for the 2012 Halloween season.  Get them on the main ImaginEERIEing site.

Please note that these puppets have different features than the 1.x series, so be sure to try them out in advance of using them in an attraction. Most notably, the microphone input and prescripted performance control modes are now gone. The former caused huge problems for many people and delivers subpar performance, and the prescripted performance setting is now easily covered by screen capture software.

All the new versions of the puppets are free upgrades for existing users. Enter your serial number for an older version of the puppet, and it should work.

Happy haunting!

Working on new puppets for 2012

Greetings, home haunters.  Here's an update from your friends at ImaginEERIEing.

For the 2012 haunting season, we're (sadly) not introducing any new puppets. But we are rewriting our digital puppets from the ground up, and will be releasing them as a free update to all users.

Here's what's going on.  Our current digital puppets were created in a 3D framework called Adobe Director.  Unfortunately, Adobe's support of the Director product has been nothing short of abysmal; the last update was released in the year of our lord 2008.  Up until now, it hasn't posed a problem, but with both recent versions of Mac OS X and Windows, our puppets are starting to fail, and since it appears Adobe is not going to update Director, we have no way of fixing these problems for our customers.  (Thanks, Adobe.)

So, we're porting our puppets over to the robustly-supported Unity platform.  We're having to do everything from the ground up, but our puppets are going to work better, and we'll be better able to support them on this new platform.

If you've purchased one of our puppets in the past (except Frosty), and would like to help us beta test the new puppets, drop us a line!

Moving to new locations

For those of you still following our blog, we're moving our Halloween-related content to a new location. This feed should still work, but the new home for our Halloween efforts will be at http://carnivalofsoulsnm.com. I've updated the site with our 2008, 2009, and 2010 content, so if you haven't seen what we've been up to, now is the time to check it out - there's some great stuff we've added about our first walk-through haunts.

In addition, we've updated our ImaginEERIEing.com site.

Enjoy!

Interesting Use for Yorick

Here's a use for our digital puppets I hadn't seen before: recreating the audience chamber scene from Wizard of Oz.

For Halloween 2009, Chris used our "Yorick" digital puppet as the ominous head over synthetic flames to retell the story with his own, Tim Burton-esque spooky spin on it. Be sure to check out the other cool stuff this home haunter put into this year's highly original haunted theme while you're there.

Carnival of Souls 2009 a success!

We're exhausted, but Carnival of Souls 2009 was a success.

In all, we had nearly 40 volunteers helping at our house this year at one time or another. All together, we were able to put on one of the best seasons of Carnival of Souls ever. New elements this year included:

The Cursed Treasure - A new carnival game which lets kids roll balls down an inclined playfield where stacks of coins and other pirate treasure lay scattered. Depending on where the ball rolls, the kids would get different amounts of candy. It was a huge hit, and a great improvement over "toss a rat in a bucket".

The Spider Cave - Though a little too imposing for some kids, the spider cave allowed the brave souls who attended to go inside and have the spider answer a question, any question. It turns out our spider puppeteer did such a great job that the spider cave became quite popular.

The Pirate Graveyard - This walkthrough attraction included a ghostly possession of Madame Sarita, a large ruined bastille inhabited by undead pirates, and a journey over the sea on a sunken pirate ship helmed by an undead captain, where kids could shoot cannons at the damned crew of Anne Bonny and Mary Read. We had some technical difficulties with the final scene a few times, unfortunately, but we got them ironed out quickly.

Pirate Barter - Instead of just getting candy this year, the attractions doled out pirate treasure: coins, jems, strings of pearls, etc. Walking around the show were some greedy pirates who would barter with kids for this treasure in exchange for candy and toys. Kids loved being able to buy their treats with the booty they earned.

Of course, some of the old mainstays were still in effect, such as the Magic Mirror, which is always a hit with the kids. And Dr. Richman returned with his "Creepy Crawly Emporium".

All in all, it was a fantastic year for the tots. Thanks to all our volunteers and visitors! We're already looking forward to 2010.

Carnival of Souls 2009 teaser

Here's a teaser photo for Carnival of Souls 2009. These are some pirate ship cannonades my brother built for the main walkthrough haunted house attraction. They look awesome, don't they?

And oh, what's that little black cable sticking out from under the cannonades? Is that a USB cable...?

I'm looking forward to seeing all our friends on Halloween next weekend. See you then!

New Versions of Digital Puppets Up!

We've been busy at ImaginEERIEing with our home haunt, but that doesn't stop us from trying to help you make your Halloween better.

We just released two new versions of two of our signature digital puppets:

Mirror Mirror has been updated with a new feature that allows the Mirror face to fade away when it is set to "asleep" mode. This allows your Mirror face to magically appear somewhere your visitors may not expect it.

Gordo has been updated with a new feature that allows Gordo's exterior to be rendered completely black. This allows you to project Gordo onto a real pumpkin, and have it appear that it is magically animated. The effect is truly fantastic - I'll try to get some video of this up in the coming days.

(Since both of these improvements haven't been tested extensively yet, the downloads are only available on the main site. The download link you receive when you buy will still be the older, known stable version. If you don't need the above features, we recommend you stick with the stable versions, since these are not maintenance releases.)

Problems with our Hosting

Our long, reliable host, which we've been hosting with since the 90's, was bought by another company called "agavue" recently, and already the service is careening downhill. We sell digital puppets for Halloween, and on October first, of all dates, all the files we had hosted on their servers vanished. The entire directory is just gone, so it's not even something that could have been user error on our part. And our original host's late-hours technical support has been replaced with a nine-to-five tech support, so I can't even talk to them about it until tomorrow. Super.

If you were trying to download one of the demo versions of our digital puppets in the last few days, and were told that the file no longer exists, well, this is why. I've updated the demo download links to grab them from a different server.

Sorry for any inconvenience.

Online Trick-Or-Treating

Doorless Chambers is a site that organizes online trick-or-treating for virtual Disney-themed goodies from October 25 through 31. Interesting concept. I might have to participate this year, if I can come up with something decent to share.

DIY Magic Mirror

The guys over at DIY Magic Mirror used Mirror Mirror and Yorick to create the videos for an installation-based Magic Mirror program. You can extend what his mirror installation does by using any of our digital puppets.

If you create an installation from them, be sure to send us photos and videos - we love to see what people do with them!

Carnival of Souls 2008 a success, but not without problems

This is just a brief note, for those who may be watching, that Carnival of Souls 2008 was a big success this year, but we did have a few problems.

The haunted house was spectacular. The many volunteers came together to make a thrilling experience for visitors. Cries of "That was AWESOME!" were heard throughout the night, and we even had kids stop by the day after to tell us how much fun they had.

There were some problems, however. We had a lot of last-minute cancellations from volunteers, leaving us with eight fewer volunteers than we expected. In addition, we had some people who were only able to work part of the night, so even with covering those losses, we still had holes over the course of the evening. The front yard bore the brunt of this - the carnival games stood unmanned for a good portion of the night, and there was no usher for the Magic Mirror, which caused some trouble. The people who were here soldiered on, and some last-minute volunteers made the situation better than it otherwise would have, though, so it wasn't a disaster. But I do feel bad for the smaller kids who were too young for the haunted house who came and found none of the front yard stuff going.

I'll try to get a page about 2008 up on the web site in a few days. Until then, if you are a volunteer or a visitor, feel free to leave a comment about how YOU thought it went.

Kohler Haunt's Magic Mirror

Here at the Carnival of Souls, we love to see what people do with the digital puppets we provide for people to use.

Today, the House of Kohler sent us some great video of the Magic Mirror in action at their haunt. It looks like they have a great little yard haunt, complete with fireworks.

This video is a good one to watch because the puppeteer of the mirror had to deal with a rather quiet young boy who looked a little apprehensive about the entire place. He did a really good job setting the boy at ease while still maintaining the sense of magic about the place.

You can see other peoples' implementations of our effects at our Friends of ImaginEERIEing page. If you have photos or video of the Mirror (or any of our other ideas) at your own home haunt you'd like to share, be sure to submit your haunt.

Boney Island

I don't often find other haunts which really strive to be age-appropriate for all audiences. But the Boney Island Yard Haunt, by Simpsons producer Rick Polizzi, certainly captures the spirit of "Halloween for Everyone."

Although he takes a different tack than our own Carnival of Souls - his is much more whimsical and humorous - we both agree that there should be a Halloween venue for younger kids which doesn't involve getting chased with a chainsaw.

His display looks absolutely fantastic. He has many motorized props, so the place looks like it is bursting with activity: singing skeletons, ferris wheels, rides, spooks telling jokes, etc. It all has a very charming look to it.

Unfortunately, due to neighbor complaints, 2007 was his final year, after a ten year run. Sad to see, but I'm very happy I got to see this inspirational footage. Rick obviously added a little magic to many kids' lives with his work.

Save Madame Sarita Page Up

I finally got around to posting a web page about Save Madame Sarita.

This was our new attraction for 2007, basically an interactive, installation-based video game where players use mystical artifacts to enter the spirit world, defeat Marius Blackwood, and Save Madame Sarita.

For more detail, video, and a behind-the-scenes look at how the mystical controllers worked, visit the web page.

Singing Busts Hacked!

As I mentioned earlier, I was planning on using the instructions at my-mania.com to hack the 2006 Target talking busts to create talking busts that move their mouthes to custom audio.

Well, long story short, I had a bit of trouble, but managed to work around it. I also noticed a few shortcuts in terms of accomplishing the hack. To see video of the final hack, and get some more info on how we worked around the problem, you can visit our talking busts page. If you want to do this hack yourself, you will still need to use the instructions at my-mania.

A Quick Plug for Midnight Syndicate

As much as we'd like to take credit for it, Midnight Syndicate is the soundscape source for our haunt every year.

As a refreshing change from most bands, Midnight Syndicate is uncommonly open to people using their music for horror-themed attractions, going so far as to give you permission royalty-free right over the web using a form on their site. They touch base with their haunters every year, and even feature people using their music at both pro and home haunts on their web site.

They have a new CD available for the 2008 season called The Dead Matter, a soundtrack that is paired with a movie they scored of the same name. You'll find it in the usual places for music, but you will also find it at your seasonal Halloween stores, in all likelihood. If you'd like a spooky soundtrack, be sure to pick up a Midnight Syndicate CD. These guys are active, generous supporters of the home haunt community, and make Halloween that much more magical for kids all over the country.

Upgrading the look

They say beauty is only skin-deep.

In the case of the Carnival of Souls web page, that's certainly true.

I've just updated the look of the main Carnival of Souls web page, but I haven't had a chance to update the stuff behind it. (I also updated my main page, too.) I'm not sure if/when I'll get to the other pages on the site, because, well, it's a mess under the hood. This site has grown organically since 2003, and it needs to be cleaned up. Unfortunately, Halloween is a mere two months away, so I'm not sure how much time I'll be able to spend on it.

My goal is to get some of the most oft-visited pages re-skinned, just to save people from looking at my early-2000's web design. Just don't expect to have every page skinned anytime soon.