Concept Art: Douglas Rogers & the Evolution of the Castles

[RandySavage]

Douglas Rogers is a very accomplished film artist (Shrek, Tangled). WDI brought him onboard to design its new castles in Shanghai & Hong Kong. Thankfully, for those of us who enjoy concept art and the design process, Rogers has his own website showing off a LOT of art for these projects. douglasrogers.design

I'm sure many will find their favorite iterations. For me, I liked the earliest Shanghai ideas and, for HK, there are couple stunning mid-development pieces. This is my favorite artwork for HKDL:

An earlier Anaheim-inspired version:

Shanghai earlier versions:

 

[Animaniac93-98]

An earlier Anaheim-inspired version:
View attachment 550373

Other than keeping the original tallest turret, I like this design for HKDL.

 

[IMDREW]

Douglas Rogers is a very accomplished film artist (Shrek, Tangled). WDI brought him onboard to design its new castles in Shanghai & Hong Kong. Thankfully, for those of us who enjoy concept art and the design process, Rogers has his own website showing off a LOT of art for these projects. douglasrogers.design

I'm sure many will find their favorite iterations. For me, I liked the earliest Shanghai ideas and, for HK, there are couple stunning mid-development pieces. This is my favorite artwork for HKDL:
View attachment 550371

An earlier Anaheim-inspired version:
View attachment 550373

Shanghai earlier versions:
View attachment 550374

View attachment 550375

These Hong Kong colors are soooo much better!

 

[ParkPeeker]

thanks so much for sharing!

This is my favorite artwork for HKDL:

wow, I love this version!

An earlier Anaheim-inspired version:

also haha I see Fantasy Faire on the left, wonder what that's about. Really cool seeing these

 

[HomeImagineer]

Douglas Rogers is a very accomplished film artist (Shrek, Tangled). WDI brought him onboard to design its new castles in Shanghai & Hong Kong. Thankfully, for those of us who enjoy concept art and the design process, Rogers has his own website showing off a LOT of art for these projects. douglasrogers.design

I'm sure many will find their favorite iterations. For me, I liked the earliest Shanghai ideas and, for HK, there are couple stunning mid-development pieces. This is my favorite artwork for HKDL:
View attachment 550371

An earlier Anaheim-inspired version:
View attachment 550373

Shanghai earlier versions:
View attachment 550374

View attachment 550375

Hey Randy can you think of An earlier Anaheim castle-inspired version like that photo of an idea What If/Parallel Disneyland California on your Ideal Buildout Site please, i would love to see that on the Blogspot.

 

[DLR92]

I kinda wish Disney opt for the Anaheim inspired castle scale.

 

[the.dreamfinder]

“Most recently, he has been working as a Concept Design Principal for Walt Disney Imagineering,reconceptualizing and expanding The Castle of Magical Dreams for the Hong Kong Disneyland Resort. Prior to that, he completed several Imagineering projects for the Thea Award winning Shanghai Disneyland Resort,most notably designing the center showpiece of the park, The Enchanted Storybook Castle, the largest Disney castle in the world. Rogers is the only person to have ever designed two Disney castles.”

That is a lie or dude doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

 

[lazyboy97o]

Yikes. While the images are well rendered their content shows that the problems with the Chinese castles truly are fundamental and foundational. Architectural forms are squashed and stretched like an animated character with no concern for their original underlying rationale. And to think Tom Morris was in the building...

 

[LittleMerman]

Very cool, thank you for posting!

 

[Toni25]

I feel like there isn't much Shanghai Concept Art out there?
It seems pretty hard to find blogs & stuff on what kinds of attractions were planned but never executed, every park has those.

 

[RandySavage]

^ There are couple variants on the overall design I've seen and one is too blurry to tell much except it is more traditional with a railroad and Frontierland:

Then there is this very different early concept from the Maps book:

Once the park settled on the general design that opened, I've seen some art for two big things that got watered down:
There was to be a very big, outdoor, ship-to-ship Pirate stunt show amphitheater. That got changed to the indoor show.

I had heard that Mickey Ave/Gardens was at one point going to take a more sophisticated approach with a covered section based on Paris' Grand Palais and World Showcase-style geographic theme-ing (e.g. London, Arabia, Italy, etc.) . Too blury to see if that is what's being shown here:

 

[lazyboy97o]

I feel like there isn't much Shanghai Concept Art out there?
It seems pretty hard to find blogs & stuff on what kinds of attractions were planned but never executed, every park has those.

A lot of that stuff ends up being released by the people who did the work, and they’re still working. Getting approval to show things from Disney can be a big undertaking and running afoul of the Company can have serious consequences.

The park’s opening day attractions were also rather locked in by 2010. So there isn’t much that got far into development before being cut.

 

[Disneysea05]

I would hope that second concept art was for HK and not the original Disneyland.

 

[co10064]

I feel like there isn't much Shanghai Concept Art out there?
It seems pretty hard to find blogs & stuff on what kinds of attractions were planned but never executed, every park has those.

I have also heard that Disney intentionally withheld concept art to reduce possible copying of attractions from local Chinese competitors.

 

[No Name]

Rogers has his own website showing off a LOT of art for these projects. douglasrogers.design

I would just like to inform everyone that Mr. Savage also has his own blog with a lot of great ideas and great art he made, called Ideal Buildout. Great stuff.