New arcade room build!

Final question for the night, is what to do with the entrance to the game room. What was once a wall with 2 doors on it, opening to each of the 2 bedrooms, has now been ripped out and a large opening now starts the entrance from the small hallway into the game room. The room will have the blacklight carpet, but as u can see from the pic, the rest of the hallway has just regular carpet. Trying to figure out what to use as an "entrance" into the room has me stuck! Only thing i can think of is using beads, or a large curtain. I just dont know on this one! Any thoughts?

lol... don't do beads or curtains... google "folding door" or "accordion door"
 
More pics that i could try incorporating into the walls somehow...
 

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More pics that i could try incorporating into the walls somehow...

Stripes, like the centipede ones you posted....but have the light bikes incorporated into them....also would be cool to use those trace designs in there as well. Simple, effective. :)
 
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As for the black lights, i will have some 4 footers on the ceiling, but also want to get some lower to the ground to help make the carpet pop under the black light. The ceiling is going to be painted the same base color as tge walls. I saw this pic of what looks like 24" black lights in between the games along the bottom. What do you guys think of that? I dont think i would do them on every single game, but maybe every other?

Do not put the tubes that close to the games, it will severely prematurely age the artwork getting that concentrated UV. And the tubes are a little warm to the touch when on after a little while.
 
Do not put the tubes that close to the games, it will severely prematurely age the artwork getting that concentrated UV. And the tubes are a little warm to the touch when on after a little while.

Yes, i had heard that somewhere. What would recommend then to get the lights closer to the floor to really help make that carpet glow?
 
Stripes, like the centipede ones you posted....but have the light bikes incorporated into them....also would be cool to use those trace designs in there as well. Simple, effective. :)

Ya, there are multiple designs j like, especially the stripes. But i dont want just one design, like using only Tron. I am trying to think of how to use those, plus add other designs, like something star wars as well. Maybe different designs on different walls. Tron around my tron game, and something star wars around my 2 stsr wars pins and upright arcade. Choices, choices...!
 
I am thinking of using the inset from the old closet to put my 2 star wars pins in there, and then have my SW upright to the right of them. Maybe that area could have star wars designs, maybe the stripes, and at the end of them have a silhouette of an x-wing, Falcon or Tie fighter?
 

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Yes, i had heard that somewhere. What would recommend then to get the lights closer to the floor to really help make that carpet glow?

Try it with just the ceiling lights first. You might not need anything closer. I picked up the carpet remnant that animesuperj was selling and saw this in person. It pops plenty with just the ceiling lights. From his sale thread...
 

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Keep it simple. Paint the walls, add the stripes with a bike or two, but just remember that most of the design will get lost behind the games. The more you do the harder it will be to cover if you ever need to sell, and in the end the cleaner designs look better with games. The games have plenty of art and coolness, let them be the focus.
 
Not the easiest thing to find, but I REALLY like the white black light bulbs we have at The Garcade. I receive a lot of compliments on them. They look purple rather than an almost non-existent blue, have just as much uv-light reactivity, and give off a small amount of "white light" to keep the arcade lit beyond just the marquee lights. Basically, the same bulb we use in black-light reactive games, just bigger.

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B00AU2SZVE/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

We use them along with blue safety light covers over standard white t8 bulbs to add some cool lighting effects.
 

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Try it with just the ceiling lights first. You might not need anything closer. I picked up the carpet remnant that animesuperj was selling and saw this in person. It pops plenty with just the ceiling lights. From his sale thread...

That does look good! How many black lights do you have hung up in that room?
 
Keep it simple. Paint the walls, add the stripes with a bike or two, but just remember that most of the design will get lost behind the games. The more you do the harder it will be to cover if you ever need to sell, and in the end the cleaner designs look better with games. The games have plenty of art and coolness, let them be the focus.


Ya, the more i am researching, the more i am thinking that also. Stick with the retro stripes, and maybe just use my neon signs as decor instead of painted on the wall.
 
Yeah, that yellow/orange stuff has always said 70s to me. Groovy, but not modern. The roundedness of at least early 80s corners might be like the yellow/orange, but not as much as the other one; usually in-between.

I don't care for Tron Legacy and all that so I would say totally no on those types of graphics.

Garcade image has bright light from the left (hallway?) coming in, so I can't see the effect the white flours have. Might be cool.

Door-wise: those shutter doors look good, although do you want any sound canceling into the hallway?, cos those probably won't hold much back. Hallway carpet looks fine. Especially if that door to the right is the garage, I'd guess the wife would want to keep it as is.
 
That does look good! How many black lights do you have hung up in that room?

You'd have to check with Animesuperj as it's his arcade in the pictures. From the pictures there are the 2 fixtures that each have 4 bulbs in them (standard 4 foot bulbs) and you can see they are the white blacklights, not the blue blacklights. I think there might be at least 1 more fixture, but don't remember for sure. Was looking at the carpet not the ceiling. :)

I know you've already got the carpet, but did you see this one? Where are you getting the carpet from? I haven't seen that pattern on any of the places I looked at.
 

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I know you've already got the carpet, but did you see this one?


That's pretty damn close. All the right colors and hues, and the right amount of lines and curves. Up close those little 'notes' are a little campy. I bet they were intended to be suggested notes, and also adorn the lines. But the coolest of that would be a diminished pattern, removing the smaller angle, which would also separate the large angle from the circles. Space - though more 'defined' as well. Oh, wait....that might make the whole carpet look like it was waving, though. Which could be wEird.
 
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I have 4 fixtures, each with 4 bulbs in them; total of 16. The only reason there's so many (I could probably have less) is I reused the lights that were in the basement. I tried do a "budget friendly" build, as similar to what Chris (cnlmoore), you really don't see the art or anything on the walls. It's about the games, so I kept it simple knowing it'd be covered in games and I'm painting the ceiling black.

For the bulbs, they're the "typical" blacklight bulbs; the ones that look purple. I didn't want white blacklights, as I didn't want to light the room up; I only want the UV effect. White blacklights throw UV and normal wavelengths; so you get a "normal" fluorescent bulb with the blacklight.
 
For the bulbs, they're the "typical" blacklight bulbs; the ones that look purple. I didn't want white blacklights, as I didn't want to light the room up; I only want the UV effect. White blacklights throw UV and normal wavelengths; so you get a "normal" fluorescent bulb with the blacklight.

My bad. From the pic they looked like the white BL.
 
Final question for the night, is what to do with the entrance to the game room. What was once a wall with 2 doors on it, opening to each of the 2 bedrooms, has now been ripped out and a large opening now starts the entrance from the small hallway into the game room. The room will have the blacklight carpet, but as u can see from the pic, the rest of the hallway has just regular carpet. Trying to figure out what to use as an "entrance" into the room has me stuck! Only thing i can think of is using beads, or a large curtain. I just dont know on this one! Any thoughts?

barn doors! they look super cool , and the hardware you can get anywhere now. i used https://rusticahardware.com/mountain-scrap-metal-door/ rustica for my stuff , but home depot carries it now and you can make whatever kind of doors , window covers your imagination can think of.
 

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Arcade as of today! Primed and ready for paint! I got the dark blue paint on Thursday, but after doing a small test run, its just a bit too dark. It almost looks black. I want it prettt dark, but still be able to tell that it's blue. So gonna see what the painters can do for me. Add some white in the paint, or have to get a new gallon. Will wait till Monday to find out!
 

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