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Vulcania entrusts Jora Vision a €4.4 million dark ride
about legends of volcanoes
Update : 13/02/13 - 10h36Published by François Mayné the 12 February 2013, New.
The french edutainment park Vulcania, which passed the milestone of 4 million visitors on the occasion of its tenth anniversary last year, will add once again some new attractions about volcanology this season.
The main one, called 'Volcans Sacrés' (which means 'sacred volcanoes'), will be a large dark ride in which the public authorities of the Regional Council of Auvergne, the park owner, has allocated a budget of €4.4 million (approx $5.9 million), nothing less than the biggest investment of Vulcania's history for a single ride! Its theme: a journey into the heart of legends and myths surrounding the volcanoes, from the Devils Tower in the United States to the Mount Vesuvius in Italy or the Kīlauea in Hawai.
"This is really a huge new addition for a park of the size of Vulcania," states Catherine Damesin, Executive Director. "Since 2007, just after that it was decided to revive the park with a new concept, the operator (editor's note: SEM Volcans) and the Council have chosen to invest each year in novelties. It is essential to stay attractive for our current visitors and attract new ones. We usually have a budget of around 1.5 or 2 million euro per season, which allows us to renew exhibitions, improve the guest facilities and building new attractions such as the simulator 'Mission Toba' in 2011. But with Volcans Sacrés, we move to something bigger, this is a high end attraction!"
The term of high end is actually a good way to summarize this project whose management was entrusted to the Dutch company Jora Vision, which specializes in theming and now adds new skills by proposing turnkey attractions. "It's been two years since we work on this dark ride than we imagined with Vulcania, designed in-house and which finally taking shape before our eyes," explains Florence Aldelbrecht, Jora Vision's representative in France. "We are very pleased to have won the public call for tenders, it was quite a challenge for a project of this scale! The french public market is not easy to deal with, there are a whole series of procedures that may seem complex to a foreign company. But Jora Vision had already experience in this field having worked for Futuroscope, including for Arthur: l'Aventure 4D which won a Thea Award."
Volcans Sacrés will be 5 minutes long for an expected hourly capacity of 500 people. The ride occupies an area of over 600 square meters (approx 6,460 square feet) under ground level and is located in the center of the main building of the park, which required to dismantle a previous attraction and a shop. The ride system is delivered by another Dutch company, ETF Ride Systems, which provides eight 6-seater Multi Mover vehicles whose characteristic is that they are wire-guided, ie they can move trackless.
This technology, which is a first for a french theme park, combines a system of infrared sensors installed at the base of each vehicle and a copper wire slightly embedded in the floor which is electrified to create a magnetic field. The whole is managed by a control system that determines the speed of the vehicles as well as the traffic on the track. This technique allows greater freedom of the vehicles movement in the attraction. They can for example move forward and then backward from a scene to another, or even go round in circles in the same room, which is the case during the final scene of Volcans Sacrés.
In addition to the wire-guided motion, each vehicle can rotate at 360° thanks to an engine installed at its base. Each will also be equipped with rechargeable batteries and a system of sensors to avoid collision with an object or a person on the circuit. "We wanted to combine the best technologies for this project, this is why we decided to work with ETF Ride Systems," says Florence Aldelbrecht.
The course of the dark ride is divided into six scenes (for six volcanoes) with very different environments, some of which are real sets while the others are giant screens. To immerse passengers into the six legends that are told by a voice-over, Jora Vision has appealed to its subsidiary Jora Entertainment. The company is in charge of the scenography and chose to work with video-mapping, lighting effects, smoke screens, a rotating tunnel, about ten animatronics (manufactured by the US company LifeFormations), ambient sounds and even ... some olfactory effects! The final scene will be the more impressive because two vehicles and a mobile decorative element will cross each other into a large room symbolizing the heart of a crater in eruption. "The pace of the ride will sometimes be slow and poetic, as with the scene of the Fuji-san in Japan, or otherwise more exciting as the scene of the Kīlauea of Hawaii," says Catherine Damesin.
To give visitors the impression that they are moving inside of a volcano, the walls are made of concrete to imitate the volcanic rock and several video projectors are to be installed along the way to give the illusion that each vehicle float on a lava underground. In addition, each vehicle will be decorated like a rock whose color will change several times during the ride. To make the attraction more realistic, Jora Vision has worked with a volcanologist and the scientific team of Vulcania, while asking several craftsmen and artists to create some of the accessories, such as Massai jewelry or an Amerindian tipi.
From a Marketing point of view, Vulcania will focus its communication plan on the launch of a promotional website featuring a trailer of the dark ride and a series of making of. "Then, we will have two separate advertising campaigns, one focusing on Volcans Sacrés for our regional target, with posters and a radio spot, and one general campaign about Vulcania at a national level," explains François Heid, Communication Director at Vulcania.
The countdown is now launched. Volcans Sacrés must be ready for the opening day of the 2013 season, ie on March 20 as confirmed by Catherine Damesin: "We have a little less than 40 days to complete the project, it will most likely be ready the night before! This is pretty much the same thing every year for us, because we open novelties every season and we have just a short time during the winter to build them. Fortunately, we work with real professionals here, Jora Vision does an outstanding job!"
The goal of attendance for 2013 is to do as well as last season, ie around 340,000 visitors. The timing of school holidays is considered less favorable by the park but Volcans Sacrés, together with the traditional program of entertainments and special events organized throughout the year, could create a surprise.
If you want to see more photos of the construction site of Volcans Sacrés, please visit our Facebook page.
Interviews conducted by François Mayné on February 7, 2013
We thank Vulcania press team for its hospitality.
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NewsParcs will do a full coverage of the IAAPA Attractions Expo 2013 in Orlando to have a look at the latest trends and developments of the global theme park industry.
From a Marketing point of view, Vulcania will focus its communication plan on the launch of a promotional website featuring a trailer of the dark ride and a series of making of. "Then, we will have two separate advertising campaigns, one focusing on Volcans Sacrés for our regional target, with posters and a radio spot, and one general campaign about Vulcania at a national level," explains François Heid, Communication Director at Vulcania.
