When I visit (3 weeks to go), Tokyo's Mansion will have just com eback up from HMH. I'll be curious to see if they've received any of the enhancements that we've got Stateside. (I'd actually be thrilled if they still had the classic bride.) Also, I'm hoping their POTC will be Depp-Free. (Anyone know?)

Is that the same as Depp-rived?? :p

As far as I know they got johnny as well.

That is something that has annoyed the bejeebus out of me for years. To fix that (from jumping to seamless) would be SO easy.

And what's bugged me for years in the room is the addition of the "hmmmm" from the WDW version (albeit, yes, in the original Frees recordings). But it's not original to original Haunted Mansion, and the addition drives me crazy.


(Those of you who have Disneyland 50 or Happy Holidays CD sets will note the recreated absence of the hmmmm, and restoration to original stretch room spiel.)

Ok someone 'splain, cuz I'm curious about this (from a conversation on another board). How do they do the pictures in the attic, with the husband's heads popping on and off? And did the lighting always change from bright to dim each time on the pictures when it did that, cuz I don't remember that at all either.

I can explain. The attic is haunted. Just like the rest of the mansion. Booooo... haunted oil painting.... booooo!

HAHAH thanks GC. That's what I thought. Damn that ghostly illumination.

Actually someone explained it elsewhere -- it's the scrim effect basically, where there are two pictures sandwiched close to each other. The top picture has the heads, and the bottom picture does not. So there are LED lights embedded in each portrait (to illuminate the back portrait). As the LEDs get brighter, the spotlight shining on the portrait grows equally dimmer, giving the illusion that the head disappears.

However, if the lighting isn't correct, it does what it's doing now, which is to say, each time the picture changes it goes from DIM (when the LEDs are on) to BRIGHT (when the spotlight is illuminating the front picture).

So like when one takes a picture with flash, the head will always be there since the front part of the picture is being illuminated.

Pretty cool. But they still need to fix the lighting.

It's a wonderful effect. It's my favorite addition to the Mansion. (But I hate it when the portraits are covered in spitballs... gross.)

Frankly I think we notice things others don't because we are trying to see them-