Walt Disney Imagineering tackled the difficult task of creating a patriotic tapestry of iconic American sights in the new Soarin’ Across America attraction that flies over 10 states and the nation’s capital in just under five minutes.
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“We knew we wanted to go from sea to shining sea,” Imagineering Executive Creative Director Tom Fitzgerald said during a Disneyland media event. “We wanted to cover the breadth.”
Soarin’ Across America debuted May 26 at Epcot and will open July 2 at Disney California Adventure as part of the Anaheim theme park’s celebration of the country’s 250th anniversary.
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How did Imagineering decide which sights to include and which ones to leave out?
“That is always the toughest thing with Soarin’,” Fitzgerald said. “We’ve got essentially 12 shots in 50 states.”
The goal was to pick a mix of patriotic locations and recognizable places that would be familiar to everyone along with a few non-specific regions that could represent the diversity of the country.
“We don’t necessarily want you to know for those shots exactly where it is,” Fitzgerald said. “We want you to feel it could be many places, so that more people see their home or their place.”
There were three key factors that Imagineering considered with each scene: Variety, difficulty and storytelling.
Variety
Soarin’ fans don’t want to see the same thing twice. That’s why this time around Imagineering opted for Los Angeles over San Francisco (that’s in Soarin’ Over California) and chose the Grand Canyon over Monument Valley (that’s in Soarin’ Around the World).
Visually the shots were broken up to avoid repeating landscapes. Even the color palettes were varied to include a mix of ocean blues, forest greens and orange canyons.
Imagineering struck a geographical balance with locations in the Southeast, Northeast, Midwest, West and Pacific Ocean. Three states got multiple scenes: Florida, California and South Dakota.
Difficulty
Most Soarin’ shots last 15 to 30 seconds, which means the landmarks need to be iconic and immediately recognizable.
“It has to be fast,” Fitzgerald said. “If you don’t know where you are, then we’ve lost you.”
Imagineering filmed aerial test shots during the pre-production phase and watched them on the giant domed Soarin’ screen to see which locations would make the cut.
“There are things in the format of Soarin’ that don’t work particularly well on a dome,” Fitzgerald said.
Storytelling
Imagineering made a creative decision to have the Soarin’ Across America visuals unfold from east to west and from morning to night to give riders the feeling of traveling on a cross-country journey.
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Here are the locations that made it into Soarin’ Across America:
- Kennedy Space Center (Florida)
- Statue of Liberty and New York City skyline
- Portland Head Light lighthouse (Maine)
- United States Capitol, National Mall and Washington Monument (Washington D.C.)
- Louisiana bayou
- Branson Scenic Railway in Ozark Mountains (Missouri)
- Mount Rushmore (South Dakota)
- Buffalo drive in Custer State Park (South Dakota)
- Grand Canyon (Arizona)
- Denali National Park (Alaska)
- Diamond Head (Hawaii)
- Griffith Observatory, Hollywood sign and Los Angeles skyline at night (California)
- Epcot (Florida) or Disneyland (California) fireworks finale
So what didn’t make the cut? Fitzgerald wouldn’t call out any specific spots, but that won’t stop us.
We put together a list of 12 locations that might feel slighted by the omission and the likely reasons why they didn’t show up in Soarin’ Across America.
1) Boston
Faneuil Hall (“Cradle of Liberty”), Old North Church (“One if by land and two if by sea” lantern signal) and Boston Common (America’s oldest public park) would be natural contenders in any patriotic film about America. Those landmarks were likely too small and not recognizable enough — especially compared to the patriotic sweep of Washington D.C.
2) Philadelphia
The Liberty Bell and Independence Hall face the same problems of size and familiarity as the Boston landmarks. D.C. won the three-way battle for most patriotic American city. Adding Philly or Boston would have tilted the geographic balance too heavily toward the northeast.
3) Niagara Falls
This was almost certainly the last location to get cut from Soarin’ Across America, but the border beauty must have had too many strikes against it. The Grand Canyon and Mount Rushmore offer similar cliff-face visual experiences. Niagara would also have added a second New York location to the mix. The smaller Yosemite Falls already appear in Soarin’ Over California. But the biggest knock could have been Canada has the better-looking side of Niagara Falls.
4) Great Lakes
The grandeur and the vastness of the Great Lakes would have been hard to capture on film. The biggest problem was likely water — there’s already too much of it in Soarin’ Across America. Maine, Hawaii, Alaska, Louisiana and even the Grand Canyon feature waterways and waterfronts.
5) Smoky Mountains
Dropping down through the bluish mist that hovers over the ridges and valleys of the Smoky Mountains must have been tempting to the Imagineers. Maybe Disney wanted to avoid comparisons to Dollywood’s new first-of-its-kind NightFlight Expedition attraction opening later this year that has been dubbed Soarin’ Over the Smokies.
6) Chicago
The Second City dropped to third in 1984 when Los Angeles surpassed Chicago in population and will likely fall to fourth behind Houston in the next decade or so. Soarin’ Across America didn’t need another skyscraper cityscape dropped in the middle after starting with NYC and ending with L.A.
7) St. Louis Gateway Arch
It would have been cool to fly through the tallest monument in the United States. Movies from “The Christmas Chronicles” to “Sharknado 4” have done CGI fly-throughs. Imagineering likely couldn’t film the inverted catenary curve without distorting it like the once comically curved Eiffel Tower in Soarin’ Around the World. Missouri was already represented by the Ozark Mountains in Soarin’ Across America.
8) New Orleans
It’s hard to imagine Disney getting permission to buzz Bourbon Street at night with an aerial drone or swoop down over the French Quarter during Mardi Gras. Louisiana was already represented with the bayou scene in Soarin’ Across America.
9) Texas
The third biggest state in the country doesn’t show up in Disney’s tribute to America. A few landmarks come to mind like the Alamo and the River Walk in San Antonio. A Texas cattle drive would have been a natural fit for Soarin’ — but Disney shot buffalo wrangling in South Dakota instead.
10) Rocky Mountains
Flying over the snowcapped peaks of the Rocky Mountains would have been an obvious shot for Soarin’ Across America — if Disney hadn’t already done that with the Matterhorn in Switzerland during Soarin’ Around the World. The American Soarin’ likely already had too many purple mountain majesties with Denali and the Ozarks.
11) Las Vegas Strip
A nighttime flyover of a neon lit Las Vegas Boulevard has been done in movies, TV shows and sporting events for decades. Plus Imagineering knew it was going to end Soarin’ Across America with a night shot of Los Angeles that would look too repetitive. A late night shot of Vegas would have also messed up the east-to-west, morning-to-night storytelling narrative.
12) Seattle Space Needle
The 605-foot-tall observation tower must have seemed redundant to Imagineering after the Eiffel Tower (Soarin’ Around the World) and Washington Monument (Soarin’ Across America). Plus there’s always the bending problem that happens with tall towers in the Soarin’ dome.
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