Since yesterday we had a lot of news about upcoming attractions - see previous article below - and the latest one is about TDL as Tokyo Disney Resort announced that the new Goofy’s Paint ‘n’ Play House attraction will open at Tokyo Disneyland Toontown on Aug 24. It's definitely an attraction for young kids but, still, any new addition is always welcome.
According to the Disney Parks blog "this Toontown attraction will allow guests to help Goofy redecorate his room in a unique and colorful fashion. Groups of guests will work together to “paint” the room using special paint applicators called Toontone Splat Masters. Guests simply aim at the wall (or furniture) they want to color and activate the applicators. The attraction will feature beach, jungle and other themes, as well as different Toontone Splat Masters, so guests can vary their choices."
That said, you might be curious to know how this Goofy’s Paint ‘n’ Play House works, technically speaking? Well, from what i've been told by a friend, it works with colors video projections on objects which are in reality in white color. A little bit the same principle than projections on buildings ( like on Magic Kingdom castles ) but with a much more sophisticated technology as the projections must be perfectly adjust with the outlines of the objects which are in the room. Not to mention that the guests are extremely close to the items and that they will identify the trick instantly if the adjustment was not perfect. So, when TDL guest will click on "red" Goofy's armchair, for instance, will appear instantly red, etc... With the new HD video projectors which are much more luminous the final result should be much better than a previous version of the same technology which was used some years ago at Epcot. Goofy’s Paint ‘n’ Play House looks like a fun addition for TDL Toon Town!
DLP CEO Philippe Gas announced in an interview in the french daily newspaper Le Figaro that TWO new attractions will open in 2014 at DLP Walt Disney Studios. In an answer at the question “What will you do to avoid the park reaching saturation?”, he said:
"Knowing that a customer is satisfied when they can see at least six attractions in a day, we estimate our maximum capacity to be 17 million visitors annually. So we still have room for improvement, but we must grow. In January, our banks have given us 150 million euros in new funding to build two new attractions, which should open in 2014 in our second park, Walt Disney Studios. In 2010, we also obtained the agreement of the State to build a third park. We are looking at it very seriously, even if the decision won’t be made until 2020. We will also build new hotels, restaurants and shops."
We already know that one of the two will be the awaited Ratatouille dark ride, but what is the second one? We might know more next friday as a ceremony for the WDS 10th anniversary will happen, with a promise of surprises. That said with, if i can say, "only" 150M euros we probably can't expect the second attraction to be another E-ticket as a big part of these 150M will go to the Ratatouille ride. As for the third park, as expected it is confirmed that no decision will be taken before 2020.
Edited: I've been told that we must not expect any announcement about these two WDS attractions during the WDS 10th Ann celebration which will happen tomorrow. Basically, tomorrow will be the usual DLP Ambassadors show and we might have to wait until DLP 20th press event on March 31st to know a bit more about all this.
In the meantime, don't miss below my second part tribute to Jean Moebius Giraud with stunningly beautiful artwork. Edited: Bob Iger told shareholders today that “preliminary design work” is under way on adding Marvel to the parks: “We’re working on some concepts and it’s our hope that in a few places around the world, Marvel characters will appear either in attractions or lands or in some form to provide entertainment, like our Disney characters do.”
Of course, all the question is "where?" and i'm placing my bets on at least two locations: Shanghaî Disneyland and DLP third theme park although i won't be surprised to see some Marvel rides opening in others Disney theme parks. Note that Bob Iger also confirmed that the AVATAR land is still coming to Disney's Animal Kingdom, with a 2015 opening, ending recent speculations that the AVATAR land project was on the way to be cancelled.
Here is the part two of my tribute to Jean "Moebius" Giraud, exceptional visionary comic book artist, who did a big part of the design of the original TRON movie and who passed away last saturday. If you've not read the part one posted yesterday i suggest that you read it HERE first. As promised, in this second part i'll show you some of his "Moebius" work and all artworks below are in high-res so don't forget to double click on each to see or get them in larger scale.
The picture of Jean Giraud at the top was shot two years ago at the Cartier Foundation in Paris when a huge exhibit opened, showing the best selection of his artworks from the early years until now. The exhibit lasted six months and was a huge success. Below, one of his most famous painting of the "Starwatcher" series.
As anyone who was in his 20's during the 60's, Jean Giraud was influenced by the music of that time, and the two artworks below are in tribute to Jimi Hendrix.
And now, here is the rare artwork that i promised to you yesterday. The nine artwork below were in fact done for the Hermès famous brand, who was releasing a new perfume and asked him if he could do some artwork on the theme of "Hermès Voyages" or "The Travels of Hermès" - who as you know was an Olympian god in the Greek mythology. As usual, even working for a brand as famous as Hermès, Moebius did some "pure Moebius" illustrations, showing indeed someone traveling in different places but almost without any references to the brand products. And as usual, it's stunning beauty, and i hope you'll enjoy these rare artworks.
It's impossible to have a mind as visionary as he had and flying as such "altitude" - not to mention his amazing sense of beauty - without having a tremendous "fire" inside. But if someone was asking me what was Moebius "secret", i think i would say that his genius partly came from his ability to keep his "fire" under control, and to redirect it in a creative way. Of course he had enough creative ambition and wanted to be the best, but his childhood which has been not really happy - parents divorced, raised by his grand parents, no sister or brother, etc... - might have been retrospectively a kind of luck. As any child he had to survive and he spent a lot of time drawing which later proved to be more important than anything. In two words, he found what he was born to do in his early years and that's one of the best luck that one can have - even if the price to pay for this was a not-so-happy childhood.
If you discover Moebius by reading these two articles and didn't knew him before, you're incredibly lucky! Why? Because you still have to discover his amazing work and it's just like discovering Venise ( Italy ) for the first time, i envy you, really . You'll find easily some of his books on Amazon and you can choose anyone you want as everything is good! Those who loved his work are generally more-than-super-fans and will miss him forever, but his production has been so phenomenal that i'm sure there is still plenty of dazzling books to discover, that we don't know yet.
Whatever parallel universe you are in now, Jean, i wish you a wonderful journey!
Artwork: copyright Jean Giraud, Humanoides Associés, Hermès
One of the most legendary and talented artist of the 20th century, Jean "Moebius" Giraud, passed away last saturday at 73. For his countless fans he was a true visionary genius and the beauty of his artwork and his incredible "line" will stay forever. But Disney fans may remind him as the one who designed a big part of the original TRON movie, and i have found for you some of his TRON original artwork.
I had the luck and i can say privilege to knew him and be a friend of him during almost 15 years - and even published a great portfolio from one of his famous work - so i'll tell you more about him in a few seconds. But first, a bit of biography: Jean Giraud was born in Nogent-sur-Marne, in the suburbs of Paris, on May 8, 1938.When he was three years old, his parents divorced and he was raised mainly by his grandparents. The rupture between mother and father, city and country, created a lasting trauma that he explained lay at the heart of his choice of separate pen names. In 1955 at age 16, he began his only technical training at the Arts Appliqués art school, where he started producing Western comics. He became close friends with another comic artist Jean-Claude Mézières. In 1956 he left art school to visit his mother in Mexico and he stayed there eight months, after which he returned to work full time as an artist. In 1962 Giraud and writer Jean-Michel Charlier started the western comic strip Fort Navajo for Pilote magazine, introducing the now famous Blueberry character.
The Moebius pseudonym, which Giraud came to use for his science fiction and fantasy work, was born in 1963. In a satire magazine called Hara-Kiri, Moebius did 21 strips in 1963–64 and then disappeared for almost a decade. In 1975 he revived the Moebius pseudonym, and with Jean-Pierre Dionnet, Philippe Druillet, and Bernard Farkas, he became one of the founding members of the comics art group "Les Humanoides Associes". Together they started the magazine Métal Hurlant, the magazine known in the English speaking world as Heavy Metal. Moebius' famous serial The Airtight Garage and his groundbreaking Arzach both began in Métal Hurlant. In 1976 Metal Hurlant published The Long Tomorrow written by Dan O'Bannon.
Arzach, first published in Metal hurlant is a wordless comic, created in a conscious attempt to breathe new life into the comic genre which at the time was dominated by American superhero comics. It tracks the journey of the title character flying on the back of his pterodactyl through a fantastic world mixing medieval fantasy with futurism. Unlike most science fiction comics it has no captions, no speech ballons and no written sound effects. It has been argued that the wordlessness provides the strip with a sense of timelessness, setting up Arzach's journey as a quest for eternal, universal truths. In 1981 he started his famous L'Incal series in collaboration with Alejandro Jodorowsky.
Moebius contributed to storyboards and concept designs to numerous science fiction films, including Alien by Ridley Scott, Tron by Disney, The Fifth Element by Luc Besson - artwork below - and for Jodorowsky's planned adaptation of Frank Herbert's Dune, which was however abandoned in pre-production.
But his influence on others films on which he didn't contributed has been phenomenal, beginning by Star Wars, according to Georges Lucas himself who by the way agreed back in 1984 to write the foreword for the Moebius portfolio i was publishing.
So, TRON. You'll see below some of Moebius artwork that he did at that time. Moebius was not the only designer who had worked on the original TRON, others talented artists also contributed but for those who knew his style what was inspired in TRON by his artwork was instantly recognizable. Below, some of his concept-arts for the TRON characters.
The next artwork are for the famous TRON solar ship.
The next artwork below was not done for the original movie but many years after its release and is obviously inspired by TRON - a TRON monster taking revenge on his creator?
Amazingly, and although different projects were on track but never finalized, no one of Moebius stories have been adapted for movies, which is incredible as the world of Moebius is so rich that it could make gorgeous movies, including animated one. Same for a theme park ride, although a great concept was developed by Bill Gorgensen, the WDI Imagineer who created the DLP version of Pirates of Caribbean, but the project didn't became reality.
As i told you, i knew him personally for many years, and the first thing which come back to my memory is what an incredible worker he was.The production of Moebius is just phenomenal and he left to us literally thousand and thousand of artworks, and if we except his early work, all of them are stunning. I remember one day i had an appointment with him at his home and when i arrived he was finishing a drawing. He didn't stopped to draw and i spent the next hours with him still finishing the artwork, putting the colors, etc... nothing would stop him and the incredible creative "fire" inside him! He was indeed an incredible visionary and i remind having long talks with him about the famous Carlos Castaneda books. He knew pretty well the world of native americans sorcery as he was initiated back in the 1950's in Mexico by Indians and hallucinogen mushrooms - he used to say that what happened in his mind at that time had an influence on the next 40 years of his life and work. By the way, it's funny to see how he look on the picture at the top, shot a few years ago, like an old native american sorcerer!
Fascinated by parallels worlds he created visions of amazing beauty, but for all others artists it's the beauty of his line and the incredible easiness with which he was drawing who makes him a real "master"...also admired by others masters like famous Japanese animation director Hayao Miyazaki with whom he was good friend.
Another friend of mine, also coming book artist in France, told me that he saw Moebius one day at Venise doing a drawing for a young fan. He was standing, and did the drawing of a female character seen tilt up - so, seen from below, just like if the character was floating in the air - and he draw the whole character with ONE line which, if you ask any artist, is amazingly difficult to do. And it was perfect. Incredible.
Was he kind? Yes, he was, but the truth is that he was totally in his creation and that nothing could stop him, which is okay for me, i perfectly understand how important it is for an artist to be totally concentrated on his work. I think i can say that he has been one of my "spiritual fathers" and he helped me in my discovery of what is called the "energetic world" , something who at 30 changed my vision of the world forever.
I also remind asking him, while i was in the preparation of the Disneyland Paris book, what he thought of the book project. I knew that Moebius didn't like that much the WDC as a corporation but i also knew that WDI Imagineers had met him and that, as he told me, he was amazed by their "artistic purity". Moebius was definitely not the kind of person to spend his afternoons at Disneyland but his answer to my question was incredibly visionary, as always: "You should do it, and if you do it well, the Imagineers who created the park may become friends of you". And you know what? This is exactly what happened!
You will find below some video interviews of Jean "Moebius" Giraud, and the second part of my tribute to him is now online HERE and include rare and stunningly beautiful artwork from Moebius, so don't miss it!
On the next one, Jean "Moebius" Giraud is speaking about out of body experiences and mushrooms' visions for a documentary about the healing herb ayahuasca.
In the next video Moebius is with Hayao Miyazaki, both were filmed when opened the Miyazaki-Moebius exhibit in Paris some years ago,
Artwork: copyright Jean Giraud, Dargaud, Humanoides Associés, Disney
Disneyland Paris 20th will start April 1st and here is some news about it. First, DLP released the new 20th visual that you can see above as well as a new ad that i've embedded below which includes some new shots of Peter pan standing in front of Big Ben and then swashbuckling with Captain Hook over DLP castle. I remind you that Peter Pan will be a key character in the Disney Dreams fountains and lasers show that Steven Davison is currently finalizing each night at DLP.
The same Peter Pan is on the front cover of the beautiful press release that DLP has began to sent as you will see on the pictures below shot by Gldsun and that i've slightly enhanced.
DLP 20th will also introduce a new parade - well, actually it will include a mix of floats from the previous parade as well as brand new floats - and this new Disney Magic on Parade will have a new song called "Magic Everywhere" that you can hear on the video below, also showing some renderings for this new parade.
But the major event of DLP 20th anniversary will definitely be the highly awaited Disney Dreams! fountain show and the first images begin to appear on forums. They're not perfectly sharp mainly because they were shot far from the castle but as you will see they're interesting. The first one shot by Jeremy from Disney Central Plaza forum shows how high will go the fountains - click on the picture to enlarge it - and as you can see they are almost as high as the castle which is pretty remarkable considering that they're using only water from the castle moats...
The next one coming from Disney worldglobe is also interesting as it shows what will happen almost at the very start of the show when Sleeping Beauty castle will be transformed in a starry night, at the exception of "the second star to the right", an effect using one of the stained glass window at the top of the castle.
Looking at how high will go the fountains means one thing: the best place to watch the Disney Dreams show will probably be not too close to the castle but, let's say, more in the center of Central Plaza. Just remember this if you come at DLP this year when you'll watch the show!
I'll see you soon for a new DLP 20th update but in the meantime don't miss the pictures of the printing of the DLP book HERE. The printing is excellent and french or english collector copies are still available for pre-order, the price of 115 euros including shipping is still valid until March 16th, after what it will be the final price which will be a bit higher, so order your copy now, you can pay by Paypal or bank transfer and just send me your order at: lawrence55@wanadoo.fr and i will send you all details to proceed to the payment.
Pictures and videos: copyright Disney, Jeremy, Disney worldglobe, Gldsun
I saw John Carter today, and here is my review and what i think about it. First, is John Carter a bad movie? Certainly not, but: is it a very good movie? Certainly not, too, and this is where the problem is. There is plenty of great scenes in John Carter, but there is also scenes which are more "B" movie. I wouldn't say that i disliked the film because it was entertaining but some scenes simply doesn't work.
I have to say that i've never read the original novel but from what i've been told by a friend who did the script is quite faithful to it. The only problem is that we're now in the 21th century and not early 20th when the book was written. So, Andrew Stanton, brilliant Pixar director, did a few changes like the martian flying ships which looks more technologically advanced than in the book where they were closer to wooden flying pirate flying ships. And this not a problem. What is a problem is that the people which are in these modern-technologically-advance flying ships are dressed like if they were coming out of a set of a Roman Empire movie. Sort of.
The question of the credibility is also sometime a problem. After all we're on Mars, some of the inhabitants are four arms green martians and others just look like humans (which apparently is also faithful to the original book). I can understand that the green martians would have a different organism than ours, helping them to breathe normally on Mars, but it's a bit more difficult to swallow for the "others" martians, looking like us Same for the hero, John Carter who is teleported from Earth in less time than it takes me to write it. The giant leaps that he is able to do are okay but it's more hard to believe that he can do all these leaps without any ankle sprain during the whole movie! Okay, it's a fantasy movie, but still...
That said some sequences are truly spectacular, and no, it doesn't look too much "Star Wars" - except may be the battle with the white apes in the arena - and not too much "Avatar" either. The western part at the beginning is okay, and i liked also the "Twilight Zone" twist at the end. Actors are good and of course as expected the Mars princess as charming as she can be is not insanely sexy as she looks in the legendary Frank Frazetta paintings. But considering that Disney is the producer, it's a no surprise. That said there is a scene in the second part of the movie which looks very "Frazetta" when John Carter is fighting alone against hundred of "bad" green martians.
According to Box Office Mojo John Carter should make $30M in its opening weekend, certainly less than expected by Disney but as the movie was released worldwide this week the opening week might be not bad. Not sure, though, that John Carter will make more than $250M - the production cost - and i'll also be surprised if there is any sequel - I wouldn't count on it and don't expect too a ride inspired by the movie. If you've planned to watch it, go ahead, there is plenty of good things in John Carter, beginning by Michael Giacchino score, just don't expect the movie of the year because it won't be. But for his first movie Andrew Stanton did a good job. Now, is there any one in the audience who have seen John Carter this week-end? Let us know what you think about it in the comments!
Andrew Stanton also talked recently about story telling in one of the always great TED conferences, and you can watch him in the video below.
After one long week of printing i'm pleased to announce you that the Disneyland Paris book "From sketch to Reality" is now finished, each page and cover, etc... has been printed! Thanks to all of you who pre-ordered the book this legendary book is coming back and as promised i have pictures of the printing to show you. I am extremely happy with the printing quality and to tell you the truth this new printing of the collector's edition is even better than the first printing ten years ago. Actually, the pictures are even more sharp!
What you'll see below is pictures of the printed sheets just after they went out of the printing machine. 320 pages takes quite a long time to print and now, the binding process will begin, the pages will be folded, cut, etc... Please also note that because these pictures were shot at the printer on some of them - because of the ceiling lights - there is some reflections, so these pics are posted to confirm you that the printing is now done and you won't be able to judge through these pictures of the quality of the printing which, again, is very good. Once the binding will be done they still have to put manually on each book their number, include the five lithographs of thee Walt Disney Studios artworks, pack everything and ship the books that, as it is scheduled are supposed to arrive at our facility at the end of April.
Something important now: The book is always available in its english or french edition but, as i've said before, the pre-order special price will soon be over and the book price will not be anymore at 100 euros but at its final price of 120 euros, plus shipping. This final price will start March19 which mean that you have one more week to place a pre-order and have a 20% discount. The price was supposed to change on February 15th but i've decided to keep it one more month. But on March 19 the final price will start so i you haven't done it yet please place you pre-order now! As usual you can pay with Paypal and Paypal payment must be sent at: lawrence55@wanadoo.fr You can also pay with bank wire transfer or, if you live in France with bank check. Please email me at neverlandeditions@gmail.com if you wish to pay in another way than with Paypal. And don't forget to let me know your shipping address!
Here we go with the pictures. Below, a pic of the front and back "end pages".
Below a picture of the cover and the dust jacket. You have another pic of the dust jacket without reflection at the top.
And now, some pictures of the inside pages. You won't see all of them as there was a lot of printed sheets but you'll get the picture.
Some additional pictures showing you more of the printed pages. The white strip on the top of each stack is of course not part of the printing.
As usual you can't see more and read a full description of the DLP book in my presentation article HERE and also on the video below showing the whole book. Again, place your pre-order NOW and get the 20% discount which will end on March 19!
The Disney and more archives are a gold mine of rare artwork, pictures, and videos. Just enter your key word, choose a search on Disney and more, click, and you're on the road to heaven!
Support Disney and more!
May be it doesn't look like but posting daily articles on Disney and more is always a lot of work. If you're a D&M fan, why not doing a little Paypal donation?
don't miss my star tours 2 website !
All about ST2 Grand Openings, High-Res pictures, videos of the ride, and more!
Discover A Real Adventureland !
Discover Bagan, The Ancient city with 2000 Temples and download my iPhone - iPad Application now available on the Appstore!
Part TWO of Rare Disney Grand Openings and Imagineering collectibles! Private sale for D&M readers! Great collectibles for Disney fans or Christmas gift !
IMPORTANT NOTE TO ALL SPAMMERS
I realised recently that Disney and more old articles were infested by spams in their comments section. ALL the spams are or will be removed. More important: now each new comment is moderate by me which means that all new spams will be deleted, even in old articles comments. The message to all spammers is clear: don't loose your time trying to post spam on D&M as it won't work anymore.
Discover the fantastic D&M Artwork section! All the original Artwork articles of Epcot, Disney MGM Studios, Animal Kingdom, Disneyland Paris, Tokyo Disneyland, Tokyo Disney Sea, Hong Kong Disneyland are now on Disney and more Artwork! Others Artwork articles are below.
is now released! Click on the book cover above to order it at the best price through Amazon.com
