The Prologue

MAGIC & CINEMA 

The earliest filmmakers considered themselves magicians - playing with light & recording like any other trick of the eyes. Slight of hand, parlor tricks, and early cinematographs were just tools for the wizard behind to make their magic. Shorts were extensions of plays, with set fourth walls, and each performance an opportunity for the director to push boundaries in illusions and visual wizardy. In fact, many of cinema's foremost founders believed the art to have little future beyond magical amusement.

Like any magical performance, cinema was an escape - a chance to believe in something outside of our world. Before the "rules" of cinema were laid that we now so readily expect - like over-shoulder camerawork or realistic storytelling - audiences were constantly amazed, shocked, and disbelievant that all that really came from one racketeering B&W projector. Filmmaking make the impossible a reality, it made people believe in a magical world just past the rolling lights of the camera.

Guests as they approach the entrance to the Criterion Theater (inspired by the theater from New York in the 1920s), will notice the ornate detail approaching the theater as if you are entering a world from a bygone era. The reflective black and white color palate of the façade indicates the time period in which you will be stepping into, going from the Golden Age of Hollywood back toward the dawn of filmmaking itself. 

QUEUE

Entering the queue area on a greyscale carpet (perhaps a red carpet if the time period were in color) guests begin by entering through a wooden doorframe and into what appears to be a quaint studio with various technological marvels surrounding them. This is the journey through the history of filmmaking technology. 

Once guests enter, to their left is what is known as a Magic Lantern, or by its Latin name, Lanterna Magica, which was an early image projector that used to place prints on plates made of glass, in between a lens, and a light source. This early 17th century invention was one of the founding pieces that would shape the common film projector known today. In addition, on the guests right hand side is a Steganographic Mirror, which is another early projection system that used to place paintings on concave mirroring to reflect sunlight. This was intended for long-distance communication. Lastly, another ancient form of projection is known as camera obscura, originally utilized to analyze solar eclipses, uses a lens to project an image on another side of the wall using geometric and ocular phenomenon.

Maneuvering through a switchback system with decorative and informative displays in-between, guests continue on from the 1600s-1700s and transcend into the 1800s as lens craft and artistic displays become more complex. The Electrotachyscope, designed by Ottomar  Anschütz, can be seen to the guests' right hand side as they pass through another switchback on the queue. To their left, they can stop by a Mutoscope, and view a moving picture inside. 

As guests approach the entrance to the theater room itself, you descend slightly to the loading area which acts as the aisle between seats in a theater, and you know you're in for an adventure unlike anything else at Disney's Hollywood Studios. 

RIDE VEHICLE 

Designed to be 'cameras' the ride vehicles for A Passage to the Stars are considered 'omnimover-like' in that they have the capacity desires of an omnimover with the personal touch of a busbar style dark ride. Seating in cameras with two rows of three guests each, there are four cameras attached to one train, similar to the design of Journey into Imagination. We call this, the 'multi-plane' camera. On your journey as a part of these four cameras, you will glide up and down the two floors of the show-building, through some of the more novel films that set the stage for films of this generation and beyond.