As Islands of Adventure is now under works for the awaited Harry Potter land, i thought it was a good time to look back to the original concept of the park, including some areas that will disappear forever.
When Universal's Islands of Adventure theme park opened, everybody was stunned: So, Universal was able to build a theme park with a theming as good and detailed as Disney?
Yes, and there were good reasons for that : some of the creators of the park were former Disney Imagineers, and they did a real good job on IOA.
Anyway, the park is indeed beautiful, and here is a "portfolio" of some of the art-work done for each land of the park. As always, click on each picture to see them in bigger size.
These two first renderings show an overview of the park and the entrance.
The artworks below is for Seuss Landing and the Cat with a Hat attraction.
At the entrance of Lost Continent, the giant arm of the broken statue.
The entrance of the Eight Voyages of Sindbad stunt show.
This next artwork was created for a scene of Dueling Dragons queue.
Below, two other renderings for Dueling Dragons, the second one show the queue decor. The coaster will be transformed in a Harry Potter coaster ride.
Three artwork for the Jurassic Park land, including the Jurassic Park attraction and the Pteranodon Flyers. A Disney and more reader who worked on the park's creation just left in the comments an interesting story about the first rendering below. Here it is: "Regarding the rendering you have featuring the overview of Jurassic Park, you can see an attraction in the background which was designed and put on hold, which still has not been realized in the park. It is the building with the helicopter perched on a rooftop landing pad. This attraction was to be called Helicoptours and was a simulator attraction, which flew visitors over the world of Jurassic Park ending in a crash landing in a dinosaur filled jungle. It was a great attraction, but one which is doubtful will ever be constructed now that The Wizarding World of Harry Potter is encroaching on some of the real estate planned for the attractions footprint."
In Toon Lagoon, the Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls attraction.
An artwork for the Popeye and Bluto's Blige-Rat Barges raft ride.
A night overview of Marvel Super Hero Island.
A rare early concept for the Incredible Hulk coaster.
Without any doubt, one of the best ride in the world: The Amazing Adventures of Spiderman.
And, to do things perfectly, you'll find below you tube videos of the Cat in the hat attraction, as well as those of "Poseidon's fury " attraction - that probably will be removed for their future Harry Potter's land - , Jurassic park river adventure, and the not-to-be-missed Spiderman ride.
Thanks to leave a comment or discuss this article on D&M english forum on Mice Chat
Artwork: copyright Universal Studios
10 comments:
Great article - love that artwork!
I remember when Robert Altman directed a Young Robin Williams in the film Popeye for Disney Studios. I thought then it would make a great park addition at WDW. Funny to see it at Universal now.
(^) that's right! that movie kind of freaked me out as a kid, but now I love it. kind of a strange, dark film - maybe not the right atmosphere for Disney, but fits right in at Univ.
The rendering which you asked what attraction it was created for was a piece we did for the queue of Dueling Dragons.
Having worked on this park it is great to see this work posted on your blog. An interesting bit of information regarding the rendering you have featuring the overview of Jurassic Park, you can see an attraction in the background which was designed and put on hold, which still has not been realized in the park. It is the building with the helicopter perched on a rooftop landing pad. This attraction was to be called Helicoptours and was a simulator attraction, which flew visitors over the world of Jurassic Park ending in a crash landing in a dinosaur filled jungle. It was a great attraction, but one which is doubtful will ever be constructed now that The Wizarding World of Harry Potter is encroaching on some of the real estate planned for the attractions footprint.
The Sinbad entrance has not been destroyed for Wizarding World. That half of Lost Continent is still as is. It's the Medieval/ Enchanted Oak area that's been destroyed.
I must agree with you also that Spidermann is still the best attraction that has ever been made up to now and still gets to NR1 in all the polls.It is worth the trip to Orlando just for this ride.
I was there for the opening and was filmed in various settings .....Does anyone know what happened to these films???I cant find them anywhere.
really.. I'm an absolutely disney fan but in my travel to orlando in 2006, Spiderman make me feel something different, I can't believe it! extraordinary technics and feelings inside the vehicle.. motion, fire, 3D, smoke, water, flying.. all the sensations in only one atracction.. AWESOME!!! (and a incredible fast queue!!)
I ache when I see stories/artwork on the creation of IOA because it was such an amazing park at opening it deserved to be home run. It never made its attendance goals due to a number of reasons beyond the control of its creators (theme park over-saturation, marketing snafus, etc.). As a double punch, IOA's failure to draw people from WDW meant that Disney's rebuttal expansion plans were shelved.
Here's hoping that Harry Potter changes that.
Several points:
There is another piece of concept art out there that shows the Helicoptours area. It's a 2/3rds overhead perspective. It was used in a display ad in the rotunda between the two parking garages for the first 3 years.
Look at the piece for Dr. Doom's Fearall, and you will see that this is actually a first generation Intamin (Giavanola) Freefall ride with covererd drop chute, and standard run out. Landmark actually had this design (project X) in their catalogue, before it was a) incorporated into the IOA plans, and b) changed to a standard S&S Space Shot.
The other sad thing about IOA is that when it first opened, the park was LAYERED with things that quickly fell away. For example, the "sliding doors" that open to the ride vehcile for Dr.Doom, had stickers of each of the Fantastic 4. Those lasted about 3 months, before guests pulled them off, and ruined them. Other, overly themed, but poorly thought out touches existed around the park.
Same thing in the Spiderman Queue, there were tons of things that used as props and decoration, but were too accessible. I have an original drawing used to make one of the "photos" that hung on a line in the "developing room" . Those lasted a bit longer than the stickers for Doom, but eventually were stolen,ruined, or just removed. Sad.
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