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View Full Version : Thoughts on Luminaria



bandboy1985
11-09-2003, 04:52 PM
now, i vividly recall that there were dozens on the board who disliked luminaria vociferiously. bearing this in mind, and the fact that there's a serious lack of evening holiday entertainment in dca at present, do you think a holiday lagoon show could be re-tooled out of the wreck of luminaria?

i believe it taught the designers several very valuable lessons-

-pyrotechnic effects (especially at low levels) need to be implemented in moderation

-not everyone enjoys images of stepford children

-concepts which appear sound on paper do not always carry through as intended into physical implementation (remember the floating message balls which strongly resembled radioactive downy balls?)

given my predilection to dance, i'd have to say the hole in disney's holiday entertainment offerings is the absence of a nutcracker. could a nutcracker be mounted on the strength of a holiday water and laser show? even thematically, would the public understand and connect the music of the nutcracker with snow effects and beautiful lighting combined with stunning fountain work and aquatic effects?

could other concepts be mounted more successfully? what do y'all think? :rolleyes:

Bounty8111
11-09-2003, 07:20 PM
It's not impossible to make the concept successful. I attended the debut performance of Luminaria and I can personally say that I have never seen, and i'm not sure I ever will see again, that many people in DCA at one time. They hyped it well, and people *wanted* to see something like that in DCA.

Admittedly, however, the Radioactive Downey Balls freaked me and most likely a few other people out.

I think your Nutcracker idea would be fantastic and awesome to see created. My big pet peeve is to see that technology just get completely abandoned and unused. The concept was certainly a good one, and if they retooled it as a backdrop to something else like the nutcracker, or expanded it into a whole new, differently themed holiday show, I certainly think it would be successful.

It just peeves me that it was a show that was completely shut down and abandoned. I know for a fact that there were at least a minority of people that left Luminaria thinking it was a relatively unqiue and neat show, and those people probably left the park thinking that it was one of those contributing factors to knowing they somewhat got their money's worth out of DCA and the Disneyland Resort that day. And I don't buy the total shut-down of Luminaria as due in any part to it's cost, either, because how expensive could a show like that be compared to Beleive?

I'm sorry, but a subpar holiday laser and fountain show is better than a black-tarped island covered in bird droppings, I don't care how many people hated it. The technology can and should be reworked into something successful.

Tigertail777
11-10-2003, 04:49 AM
well I never got to see it, but I have heard the music and thought it was quite good. I really thought the idea of kids drawings being projected was clever and highly underused (should have been more/bigger screens.
I think I like the nutcracker idea a lot too however.. as long as it uses water 'bellagio" style fountains, and lasers and little to no pyro (I saw those pics on MP... my athsma would have killed me). Also since the waters in DCA seems to be a bit more shallow than ROA, maybe animated projections either under the water, or projecting straight down on the water. Just some kind of new magical gimmick excusive to the show (like fantasmic has the water screens). since its a christmas show you could get as outrgaeous as having a sparkling christmas tree "rise" out of the lagoon (hydrolics/hidden chamber stage type thing). Heck even have a little mermaid christmas show, where she "gives" the audience a christmas tree from "Atlantea" at the end, and have bubble blowers blowing bubbles (not the snow ones.. bigger ones) and spotlights with christmas colors refracting on the bubbles. Tons of possible ideas out there that would work, how they thought the pyro in Luminaria was going to work I have no clue... didnt they test beforehand???
Anyways Disney get of yer butts get creative and put something in there! You have done yer test market already: you know what does and doesnt work, you know the crowds will come, JUST DO IT!

daannzzz
11-10-2003, 07:38 AM
I am one of those people who really liked Luminaria. It was different. It was not huge and bombastic it was warm and charming yet still had some spectacular spots. The "candles" raising up out of the water was a great effect and the "candles" covering the coaster and SunWheel were quite awesome. I think most people disliked it because the fireworks were small. It did need some work though. The spot with the kids homemade Christmas Cards, while cute and seemed like a great idea, sort of slowed it down a bit. I took video of it so can watch it each year. I hope theytry again.

spectromen
11-10-2003, 07:44 AM
The best part were the candles coming up from the water and the glowing lights all over Screamin' and surrounding areas. I wish they's still illuminate those for a brief time each night...maybe as part of the Electrical Parade. Assuming it's all still set up, why not use what you've spent your money on?