Network Rail needed a way of impressing on children the dangers of the railway.

They came to us for ideas. I proposed a display with a bit of magic thrown in. The idea was to make a 3D model of a relistic scene of a railway including dangerous situations where people could be hurt or killed. The model was viewed through a front window showing the scene.

The operator  described to the children what was going on and at the point of describimg the impending disaster pressed a button on a keyfob in his pocket. The lights in the model faded down and a ghostly head appeared floating is space in the model. At the same time a sound system started with the etherial voice of the victim describing what had happened to him (her).

This magical appearance of the floating heads was produced by a 'Pepper's ghost' system

The display also included a quiz to see if the situations had been understood

They were pleased with the idea and we built 10 or so displays which were used all over the country in schools and safety exhibitions. They are still being used today. I worked with Bob Spooner of Modelscape who made the models. I designed and built the electronics.

It was decided to model the heads rather than use photos of real people.