One of the kick off events of LDI2005 was Backstage Orlando, an insider‘s tour of the theme parks that make Orlando one of the hottest entertainment destinations in the world. This year‘s event started with the first-ever Backstage swimsuit party: actually a chance to ride the rides at Wet ‘n Wild. The highlight was the new attraction, DISCO H2O, a disco water ride with nifty LED lighting designed by Tony Hansen of Techni-Lux in Orlando, with a variety of cutting-edge LED fixtures from Pulsar. Tony Hansen and Andy Graves from Pulsar in the UK presented an overview of the project before the Backstage group headed over to Wet ‘n Wild for a BBQ and the rides.

Backstage Orlando continued on Tuesday morning at Universal Studios Florida where a creative team with Scott Trowbridge, Jennifer Sauer, and Mike Esmond (among others) made a presentation about three new attractions: Fear Factor Live, The Revenge of the Mummy, and Shrek 4D. Interestingly, all three of these attractions are retrofits or “fit” into existing architecture (Mummy, with lighting by Lisa Passamonte Green of Visual Terrain, replaced the King Kong attraction for example). Shrek 4D requires ‘ogre-vison‘ glasses for a 3D video experience with moving seats that douse you with water and bugs (actually air effects that tickle your legs).

Tuesday afternoon and evening were spent at SeaWorld Orlando where entertainment staffers including Scott McMurtrie and Jason Tart provided a behind the scenes tour at Blue Horizons, a new show that combines fabulous dolphins as well as aerial acts: the challenge is the separation of acts, the underwater mammals are cleared from their tanks before the trapeze acts begin. Backstage was also on the docket at the Odyssea theater, before the group went on to the new waterfront area for drinks and dinner on a patio overlooking the lake where a new night show, Mystify, takes place featuring water screens from Aquatique in France, dancing fountains and pyro.

Wednesday was Backstage Disney Day with over 12 hours spent trekking through the wonders of Walt Disney World, organized by the incredible Wendy Abraham from Disney. It started with an early morning visit to Soarin‘ with the opportunity to see the attraction under work lights for an insider‘s tour, as well as a second chance to ride! Plus a great presentation by Jack Blitch, VP fpr WDI project management attraction development to a tour of Disney‘s central shops (where everything from Mickey Mouse heads to tram cars are built) the day was extraordinary in many ways. Backstage at Fantasmic! plus dinner on the viewing patio to see this nightly show, then over to Epcot for Illuminations (minus the inferno barge that sadly experienced damage when fireworks on it exploded one day). Creative staffers and technicians that hosted presentations included John Haupt, Bill Ferrara, David Hinds, Chris Kelly (Disney‘s chief pyro maniac!), Dave Christoffers, TD Larry Sonn, and many others who took time out of their busy day to meet and greet the Backstage group. The group was one of the best ever and as usual was truly international, with attendees from Mexico, Canada, Panama, New Zealand, and various corners of the US. Backstage not only provided an unusual opportunity to go backstage at some attractions and meet the designers and technicians that make it all possible, but also a great networking opportunity for people from all over the world to meet each other and share ideas.

Special thanks to LDI conference manager Linda Zilliox for entertaining the troops and intern Karen for making sure we didn‘t leave anyone behind and the bus zipped from attraction to attraction and Backstage 2005 took Orlando by storm!

I was talking with Peter Monahan and Josh Jacobstein over at the Rose Brand booth (#1039) and they were telling me that the current Hairspray tour probably looks a wee bit different than the Broadway version because assistant lighting designer Philip Rosenberg swapped out the LED units that were the hallmark of the original production with a Main Light Soft-LED curtain. It was done mostly as cost-cutting measure, but Monahan says it still looks pretty cool. I’m hoping we can cover that in more detail in an upcoming issue of Live Design.

ESTA just held a press conference officially announcing the Behind the Scenes initiative, which will provide financial support to entertainment technology professionals when they are seriously ill or injured. The ESTA Foundation is raising money for this event through several means, including the $125,000 Altman Family Challenge Grant, which Mike Wood spoke about earlier this morning. The Altman family will match all pledges and funds raised for Behind The Scenes in the first year–dollar for dollar–up to $125,000. At the press conference, ESTA announced they were already over the $40,000 mark, thanks in part to a $30k contribution to the program by the Foundation’s board of directors.

ESTA also unveiled the sweet new Harley-Davidson Sportser XL 883 that will be raffled off at the end of the show, the proceeds of which will go to Behind The Scenes. Yours truly bought two, and I don’tknow the first thing about them there motorcycles. But if I win, I encourage you all to get your cameras ready for a good laugh.

Hey, I know there are a lot of charities out there. But this is geared to our industry, and I think it’s something we should all try and get behind, Harley or no Harley. So get out those wallets and support this cause!

For more info check out theESTA Foundaton site.

Good morning all we’re standing here at the Live Design booth just before the show opens with Mr. Mike Wood, Treasurer for ESTA. I’ve snagged him here to get his comments about last night’s ESTA Dinner, which was by all accounts a huge success. Mike, what would you say were the high points?

MIKE:“For me it has to be Bobby Altman’s speech, where he discussed the reasons he and his family chose to support the brand new ESTA Foundation’s Behind The Scenes, the charitable endowment created to support technicians working in the entertainment technology business. He did a great job of getting to the heart of why we as an industry have a need, in fact an imperative, to help support our own.

“The performers have support and many other sectors of the industry have backup and safety nets to catch them if they fall whereas back-stage staff don’t. Bobby and his family have had the foresight to realize this and make the first challenge grant to the new endowment fund. If everyone follows Bobby’s lead we will very quickly be in a position to give back to the industry that we all love.”

That’s great, Mike, thanks for your time. We’re off to the ribbon cutting!

It’s just about 5pm here on the show floor Thursday evening and things are starting to shape up. Those with smaller booths (or those who have larger booths but are so organized its embarrassing to the rest of us) are ready to go for tomorrow’s 10am opening. The rest of us are still here, still sweaty in this air-condition-less hall, still wondering why it’s so hard to find coffee, and still putting on the finishing touches on the booths.

The Live Design staff are heading out of here in a few minutes to get ready for tonight’s ESTA Dinner over at the Rosen Plaza. ESTA Prez Bill Groener and company have a lot of important stuff to announce tonight so it’s expected to be a jam-packed evening. But they promise it won’t turn into an endless evening of Jerry Lewis telethon like proportions, and we’ll take their word for it.

We’ll have more on that event tomorrow, when the LDI blog really hits the ground running. In the meantime, maybe we’ll see some of you at the bar later. But not too later.