Tree of Life Awakenings

As Disney's Animal Kingdom was preparing to be open after dark for the first time in its history, Walt Disney Imagineering Creative Entertainment approached Daren and Mousetrappe to create a nighttime experience at the park's icon, the Tree of Life.

This would not be the typical nighttime spectacular as it would not include fireworks (due to animal habitats, etc.) and had a limited guest capacity. While everyone knew video projection would be a key element, the rest of the concepting was left to us. We presented a modality wherein the Tree would undergo constant and ever-changing evolutions throughtout the night, but peaking with 4-5 minute short story "shows" serveral times per hour. We designed six different key stories, and hours of random "happenstances" for the rest of the evening, with oversight from Joe Rohde and Michael Jung from WDI.

Our concept was make the Tree itself be the storyteller, and that only at night can humans "see" these stories. We made fireflies become the "pixie dust" for the Kingdom, and they arrive to illuminate the stories held within the tree, and magically awaken the sculpted animals (projection mapping) on the tree who in turn become parts of the stories, all told with animation and music alone - no dialog or narrator. The fireflies became the park-wide nighttime pixie dust.

The final product features projection mapping, lighting, and beautiful custom soundtrack recorded at Abbey Road Studios in London.