Saturday, September 4, 2010

Looking for a great Disney book ? Then, the Disneyland Paris book is the perfect gift for any Disney fan !



If you're looking for a great gift to offer to anyone you love - including you! - my "Disneyland Paris, From Sketch to Reality" book with its 320 pages and 750 pictures - including 250 renderings from Walt Disney Imagineering - would be a GREAT gift for any Disney fan!

I still have copies of the book, and, as i am one of the two authors of the book, each copy will be sign specially for you or anyone you wish. Of course, don't forget to tell me the name to whom you wish i dedicate the book.

An important note before i go further: If you're not in a rush to get the book, choose the flat shipping option (also indicated below) which usually takes between 3 to 6 weeks delivery (depending if you're living in Europe or in the U.S) and is also much less expensive.

And now, here is a description of the book and everything you need to know to order one of the last signed copy of this beautiful book. Please note that NO re-printing of the book is scheduled, and these last available copies may be the REAL last one!


IF YOU'RE LOOKING FOR THE ENGLISH EDITION OF THE BOOK WITH THE TEXT IN ENGLISH:

Price for one copy of the english updated edition is 87 Euros

About the shipping:

IF YOU'RE NOT IN A HURRY TO GET THE BOOK: Flat shipping (4-5 weeks delivery) is 15 euros.

IF YOU'RE IN A HURRY TO GET THE BOOK: Air-mail shipping (2 weeks delivery) is 38 Euros.

If you have a Paypal account you can proceed to the payment by paypal - paypal payment including your choice of shipping must be sent to the email adress: lawrence55@wanadoo.fr

Important: Note that the price is in Euros, not in U.S $, so you have to choose the "euro" currency when you do the paypal payment.

If you don't have a Paypal account, a bank wire transfert is possible, just let me know.

And, of course, thanks to confirm me your order and payment AND the shipping adress by email at the email adress: lawrence55@wanadoo.fr


PLEASE NOTE THAT FOR NOW I DON'T HAVE ANY MORE COPIES OF THE FRENCH EDITION, SORRY. IF YOU STILL WISH A FRENCH COPY? PLEASE LET ME KNOW? I'LL TRY TO FIND A COPY FOR YOU.

As i am the one who designed the book, i'm not really at the good place to send compliments about it, but if you are a reader who already own the book, please leave a comment at the end of the article to let other readers know what you think about it.
Previous comments can be read at the bottom of this page where the article below was previously posted.

So, here is a little description of the book, now - See below some pictures of the book pages - click on each of them to see the photo-montage pictures in big size.



The book is a gorgeous "coffee table book" with 320 pages and 750 pictures - of which 500 are park and attractions photos and 250 are Walt Disney Imagineering renderings!

The size is 9 x 12 inches, all pages are in color and it's hardbound with a glossy dust jacket. The text (by Disney historian Didier Ghez), was written after more than 75 interviews he conducted with all the Imagineers who created the park. He goes into just about everything you wanted to know about this unique place that many describe as the best "Magic Kingdom" ever created by WDI.

It took five years to create the book, but it was worth all the time we spent on it, and the book looks just as good as we had hoped for at the beginning - in fact Imagineer Bruce Gordon told us that it was "probably the best book ever done on a Disney theme park". Coming from Bruce who did with David Mumford the great "Disneyland, The Nickel Tour" book, it was more than a compliment.

The first chapter about Main Street has 52 pages and introduces the reader to the "legend" of Main Street, USA. You'll learn all about the Disneyland Paris Railroad, the unique "Discovery" and "Liberty" Arcades; find out about the architecture, the restaurants (like "Walt's," a tribute to Walt Disney, but also inspired by Club 33 in Anaheim) and the shops; with dozens of photos, renderings, models, and reproduced for the first time here, all the "cities of the future" posters located in "Discovery Arcade."



The second chapter on Frontierland discusses the park's western side with extensive sections about its major attractions, "Big Thunder Mountain" and "Phantom Manor." In fact the book has the longest sections ever put together in a book on all the major attractions. The Pirates of Caribbean section in the Adventureland chapter is 26 pages, Phantom Manor has 16 pages devoted to it, as does Space Mountain, it's a small world, etc. The photo material was so great that we kept adding more pages to the book, which was supposed to have only 240 pages when we started... we ended up with 320 upon completion!



The Frontierland chapter also covers the Mark Twain, the River Rogue Keelboats, Fort Comstock, all the restaurants, the shops and Cottonwood Creek Ranch.and featuring stunning photos of Disneyland Paris from the air by Yann Arthus Bertrand, author of The Earth from Above that make spectacular "double-pages," and allow the reader to discover the park from a whole different angle.



The Adventureland chapter is even more interesting, as many elements of the land exist only in Paris - such as the Bazaar and Aladdin to Africa and the ex-"Explorer's Club." Plus there's a long section about "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Peril," "Adventure Isle" and "The Swiss Robinson Treehouse" and, of course, "Pirates of Caribbean" the land's major attraction and featuring its amazing Audio-Animatronics! All in all there are 56 full pages about Adventureland, and as in the previous chapters, there are dozens of photos, lots of concept art, and many shots of Imagineers at work. There's even a great bonus here, with the Marc Davis artwork for "Pirates" also included.



56 full pages are also dedicated to Fantasyland. There's an extensive look at Sleeping Beauty Castle, sections on all the dark rides (Snow White, Peter Pan and Pinocchio), as well as a look at "Alice's Curious Labyrinth," the "Mad Hatter's Tea Cups," "Storybookland," and "Casey Jr." There are even 14 pages about "it's a small world" with stunning photos of nearly all the scenes in it. Here the reader can discover a new attraction that exists only at Disneyland Paris, with a great view from above of Alice's Labyrinth.

Discoveryland also gets 52 pages of special treatment, with sections on the Visionarium, the Nautilus, Star Tours, Space Mountain, and everything you wanted to know about the other attractions in this land – Autopia and Orbitron. In fact the Nautilus chapter takes you on a visit with photos of every room of this detailed walk-through and two double page photo spreads, one which makes you feel you're inside Captain Nemo's grand salon, and the other showing you a unique view of Discoveyland featuring the Nautilus and Space Mountain in a kind of "CinemaScope" view.



When the book was released in early 2002, the Walt Disney Studios didn't exist, so you won't see them in the book. But there's still one last chapter about the hotels of the park, and Disney Village too, with the great Buffalo Bill Wild West show that entertains hundreds each evening.

And because every day in a Magic Kingdom should end with a parade and fireworks, we have the Main Street Electrical Parade that close the book, with an Herb Ryman gorgeous painting!



Pictures: copyright Disney

Monday, August 30, 2010

A Tribute to Eric Heschong Artwork



Here is the artwork article of the week, and it's going to be a great one, as i am doing a grand tribute to a hlghly talented artist: Eric Heschong.

I love Eric's artwork since ten years ago when i've discovered some of his artwork for Walt Disney Imagineering, and you all know it as i am talking about the fantastic Tomorrowland '98 paintings like this one below.



Now, today i am not going to show you the artwork he did for WDI, but other great artwork he did for Landmark Entertainment. And those of you who like to discover concept-arts of never realised projects will be in heaven today as lot of the paintings below are in this case.

Let me tell you more about Eric. Eric Heschong learned to paint at the now defunct Hanna-Barbera cartoon studios. Later, he worked doing tight architectural illustration. And then for Landmark Entertainment, a company specialised in attraction, theme parks and resorts or casinos design. if you don't know Landmark, it's them for instance who designed the Terminator 3D attraction for Universal Studios and the amazing Spiderman ride at Islands of Adventure. At Landmark, back at the end of the 1990's Eric worked with Chuck Cancillier who was the designer. Chuck would do pencil layouts and then hand them off to Eric for paint. Every so often, he'd be asked to do the layouts.

"Working for Landmark was a fun time for me." says Eric. "I enjoyed the work and tried to please. I used my portfolio from Landmark to get work at Universal Studios and Walt Disney Imagineering. Most of the work I did at Walt Disney Imagineering was for Tony Baxter."

We will begin by paintings which are part of Eric's portfolio. No need to say they are gorgeous. Definitely double-click on each picture to see them in larger scale.

The first one, at the top of this article, is an "Emerald City" painting done for a Wizard of Oz park that was supposed to go in somewhere in Kansas. Landmark didn't mind that Eric's Emerald City looked nothing like the one in the movie. The header image is also an Eric's painting, for a Warner Bros concept.

This next painting with the purple rocket was for a Paramount Pictures park. A Willie Wonka attraction (on the right) and a Godfather's restaurant (on the left) were to be featured.



The two next paintings were done of course for a Star Trek attraction. I don't think these scenes/decors were realised but Landmark is the company who did do the Star Trek Experience in Las Vegas.




The next concept with this copper colored space station was actually built in South Korea.



This Bluto Bay decor was designed for a movie company who has or had the Popeye property - it might have been Universal.



Eric did also this concept-art for a James Bond "Licence to thrill" attraction. First, i thought he did it for a previous concept of the Walt Disney Studios "Motors, Action!" stunt show, as i knew WDI envisioned to do the stunt show on a James Bond theme. Then it was cancelled and i always thought it was for a rights/license problem, that the Bond license was too expensive, etc... In fact not, it's probably because Paramount Parks got the rights to do this "License to thrill" attraction. The attraction existed for real from 1998 in three or four diferent Paramount parks.



Landmark also designed Hotels and Casinos, like this 1999 ”Muwi Kingdom Hotel” concept for Inchon, South Korea.



This next bird's eye view was to be a casino/hotel called the City of Gold. It looks similar to the one above and may be it was done for the same concept.



The interior lobby would have been incredibly spectacular - i should say dazzling. That's the painting below, with the griffins.



The next concept-art with the movie theaters and trolley car was for a Navy Pier concept in Chicago.



This one too was done for the Chicago Navy Pier concept.



This 1998 acrylic painting shows a land called "Cartoon Ville" part of a proposal for a "Shanghai Movie Park" in China.



"Heavy Metal Island" is the title of this 1999 concept-art, the entrance to an island-Rolling Stones land in a proposed Rock theme park.



The two next paintings called "Metropolis Metro Entertainment Center" were done for a Shanghai Metro Entertainment Center.




The concept-art below show a "Nautical Sports Dome" for a Niagra Theme Park.



"U.S.O. with Bob Hope" is the name of the Cell Vinyl on illustration board concept below.



This next painting was for a "Rhythm and Blues Area" in a Grammy Exposition.



As i told you Landmark did lot of concepts for casinos. Here are some paintings that Eric did for these concepts. Let's begin with the Las Vegas Caesar's Palace and this concept-art for a 1995 "Caesar's Exterior Expansion".



The next one shows a new inside decor proposal for the Caesar's palace...



And this one, always at the Caesar's, is called "Casino of the Gods".



The next 1999 painting below is named "Secondary Gaming-Train Station", a proposed expansion of the Barona Casino in San Diego.



”Rooftop Casino” is the name of the scene below - obviously inspired by the rooftop of Paris Opera (where by the way i walked upon for real some years ago for a photo shooting!).



This next 1997 painting ”Monex New York Casino” was another kind of "rooftop" view for the Century City Monex.



"Starlight Restaurant Interior” is the title of the artwork below, designed for Phantom Phantasy Casino.



These two 1993 acrylic paintings were concepts for the Harrahs Hotel/CasinoLaughlin in Las Vegas. The first one is called "Harrahs Laughlin" and the next one "Plaza Scene"




Always for the Harrahs in Las Vegas, this last artwork is called "Mardi Gras".



I want to thanks Eric Heschong and Landmark Entertainment for providing me the pictures files and authorisation to post them in this article and i hope you now love Eric's artwork as much as i do!

Artwork: copyright Landmark - Eric Heschong - Disney Enterprises

Sunday, August 29, 2010

My answer to Tangled french title



What you see above is Tangled french poster, "Raiponce" being - i suppose - the french translation or the french title for "Rapunzel". The only problem is that "Raiponce" means probably nothing for the french audience as the tale is not known here, in France. Even worst, if you talk to someone in France and ask him what Raiponce means he will think that you're talking about the word "Réponse" which means "answer" in French. And i'm ready to bet that in a few months from now everyone in France will joke on the title or will ask who the hell is responsible for choosing such a bad title.

I can understand that it's the original french title of the novel but, honestly, it's probably the worst movie title i've seen since a looong time... I must add that i don't have high expectations on this new Disney animated movie. I'm sure the animation and backdrop paintings will be brilliant but so far i don't "feel" it - but i'm ready to change my opinion if i see really exciting material from this "Raiponce". In the meantime, if you've not seen yet the first trailer, here it is below.

Add hat tip to Blue Sky Disney from where the poster picture is coming from!




Picture and video: copyright Disney