HARRY POTTER world

Ok, Harry Potter world is brilliant.

I was super tired from watching HP 7 part 2 the night before but I didn't want to get any spoilers at Harry Potter World so I had to make sure I was up to date on the movies by watching number 5 and 6 again, then both parts of the Deathly Hallows. I also re-read book 6 and then book 7 twice. It's been an intense week or two but I was up to the challenge.

 

So here it is, Harry Potter World, a re-cap of our tour.

 

• After picking up our audioguide, we went into a small cinema experience involving the 3 main characters of Harry Potter....... wait I can't reveal to much!
• Explored the real Great Hall of Hogwarts from the Harry Potter movies. It's a lot smaller then I expected and the ceiling isn't enchanted. The hall itself however is magical in its own way.
• Moved into the big room, a room that covers a quarter of the building. It includes most of the sets from Harry Potter, and no, I don't mean tea sets, I mean the real deal, the GENUINE Harry Potter sets. My favourite sets were the potions classrooms because of its genuine feel of a dank and dark dungeon feel. The potions room also contained the moving pictures from the castle walls and basically all the props. Then there was the green scene area where they made the quiditch scenes and some of the sets from number 7 part 1.

• After the set room, we moved on to the backlot where we saw number 4 Privet Drive, for real! I went and knocked on the door but nobody was home.
• Thirstily we had a cup of frothy butter beer (so yummy) and also found Hagrid's motorcycle and the night bus.
• Then, back to the tour, we headed into creature effects, a whole section of rooms dedicated to the art of making Dobby and Arogog and heaps of others. We saw all the wax figures from scenes where that character had been "stupefied" (spell) or killed, such as Fred (from a scene in Harry Potter number 7 part 2) and Hermione (from Harry Potter number 4).
• Creature Effects also make all the masks, like the gringots goblins, Fenir Greyback the werewolf from no.7. The workers at Creature effects must be very busy as they also are in charge of Animatronics which is where tehy use mechanical costumes / masks / creatures etc to help with the special effects. Some little robots look exactly like animals, some as tiny as Scabbers (Ron's rat) and some as big as Buck Beak the Hippogriff. They even had an entire animatronic Hagrid's head which the Hagrid actor double who was very tall (good to play the giant scenes) was almost bald and looked nothing like Hagrid.
• Then we headed into the model room, to see the REAL castle they used for all the wide shots of Hogwarts. It's not a real castle but it could've been, its just perfect. It's about as big 2 small cars!

 

 

 

 

 

Ok now I've got that covered let's begin in detail......

As we queued up to enter Harry Potter world (HPW) , we were thoroughly entertained by our audio guides - narrated by Draco Malfoy! It was really odd not hearing him malicious and mean. So odd it took me 2 minutes to recognise his voice!

The layout of the HPW building was fairly large and pictures from all the movies lined the walls. The flying car was suspended with its lights flashing and wheel spinning. There was a giftshop on the left, and cafe on the right. They had Harry's cupboard under the stairs next to the queue as well, for people to take photos and gawp at while they waited.

As we entered we were given a brief intro by a Potter nerd and then ushered into the cinema, where we saw a movie shot outside the great hall doors. Hermione/Emma, Ron/Rupert and Harry/Daniel meet us there (on screen) and gave us another quick intro. As they opened the doors to the great hall and stepped inside, something amazing happened. The screen rose and behind it were the real great hall doors - in real life! A second HP nerd opened it and we where bustled into the great hall, for real, the ceiling was a maze of wires and cables but that didn't matter. What mattered was

 

The REAL tables

The REAL benches

The REAL pitchers

The REAL crockery

The REAL cutlery

The real everything

 

 

 

Surrounding the tables are some of the uniforms worn by the actors. For HurfflePuff, Cedric Digery's Yule ball robes and his tri-wizard tournament uniform. For Ravenclaw, Cho Chungs uniform and Yule ball stuff is there as well. For Slytherin a couple of scarves and proper uniforms. Gryffindoor was coolest though, they had HP's first grade uniform and 6th grade uniform as well!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For the 1st time I saw the house points, sitting in the corner. Tiny little beads represented the points. They looked like little hourglasses, Ravenclaw was coming last, which is odd, I thought that you got points for wisdom.

 

 

 

 

Our nerd started getting a little bit impatient as she had another group in the cinima who, would not be pleased if there were people in the room when they entered so we were moved out of the Great Hall, into the big room and were instantly overwhelmed.

 

 

 

The wig of Bellatrix LeStrange

 

 

That's right! All of the HP wigs and most of the HP costumes they used in number 7 part one and two. There were loads of props from number 4 Including goblets, cups, astronomy equipment, Dumbeldore's office, temporary props and a couple of costumes. Next was the REAL boys dormitory including the beds and decor of Ron, Harry, Neville and Dean Thomas. A chudly cannons poster is hanging on the wall, on a high shelf are some of the knitted jumpers that Harry and Ron wore in number one

 

 

Harry's bed

 

 

 

Ron's bed

 

 

 

The coolest thing lay on the right a few steps away. Green screen technology has come a long way in the past few years, so much that you can actually keep filming a normal screen and then, have a character wear something green and POOF on screen they're invisible!

Why do I mention this?

just because Harrys invisibility cloak lining is all green. On it goes and off he goes!

 

 

notice how the lining to the cloak is green,.

 

 

 

On we moved to display case after display case, heres a summary in pictures and captions

 

 

 

the Gryphindoor common room

 

 

 

the entry to Dumbledores office

 

 

 

the big Ds office

 

 

 

the entry to the chamber of secrets

 

 

 

Harry's gringots vault door

 

 

 

the Weasly's kitchen: cereal

 

 

 

the weaslys kitchen

 

 

 

Potions Lab

 

 

 

The "magic is might" statue at the ministry

 

Personally my favourite set was the potions lab. The mechanics team had created "self stirring cauldrons". It was really freaky just watching them spin round and round with no one stirring them! Magic?

 

 

Now we entered the world of green screen technology, Quidich

 

This is really difficult to explain, but I'll give it a go

Now when I watch a Harry potter movie I've always wondered how they filmed the quidich scenes, I mean the actors can't actually fly right...

No of course not, so to make the illusion real, the director uses a green screen. Firstly the camra crew move Harry through the air on a metal beam with a broomstick on top. This metal pole can dip fowards and backwards and on full 360 spin rotation. This is behind an bright electric green green screen. That green is then easily removed from the footage to leave only the moving Harry. Then after pasting Harry into a new background of the Quidich pich, Harry looks for all the world like he's flying!

They also used green screens for the flying car and for the Gringots vault racer. Wow!

Here's a video, look out for Harry on a treadmill.

 

 

 

 

Then came all of the background artwork and design and the tapestry of the Black family (strictly no photos)

 

 

Weasley's Wizard Wheezes price list

 

 

 

The 1st letter Harry receives

 

 

 

The daily prophet ( numerous additions)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They even had Voldemort's robes!

 

After that we headed to the backlot for some time outside.

 

Here's a summary in pictures

 

 

In the flying car

 

 

 

Did you know that harry potter world is the only place you can buy...

BUTTER BEER!!!!!!!!!!!!!¡!!!!!!¡!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The beer itself is honey brown and tastes like vanilla creaming soda mixed with ginger bear, the cream on top tastes like whipped cream mixed with honey and sugar, mint and butter

So YUMMMMMMMMMY,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then I stopped in at Privet Drive

 

 

 

 

 

After 10 minutes looking round we headed into the creature effects Series of rooms dedicated to the likes of Dobby, Buckbeak and others. This is called Animatronics.

 

Animatronics are basically mechanics that look like animals. They range in size from as tiny as scabbers to as large as Arogog, This section also included all of the masks that they use throughout the movies such as the goblins of Gringotts, Lupin the werewolf and wax figures such as Dobby and Fred from number seven part one and two.

Hey and did you know that Hagrids head is actually a fake! Well it's often a fake. The animatronics Department made it for when they did wide shots of Hagrid because the actor who plays him is normal size (not a half giant). the tall stunt double looks nothing loke Hagrid so they put him in a mechanical Hagrid Head (cool).

 

 

 

The actor who plays Hagrid

 

 

 

Mechanical Hagrid head

 

 

 

This Animatronics area is full of all the things you wonder how they do. I loved it.

 

 

As we stepped out of the animatronics we headed into the set of Diagon Alley - this is the most beautiful set I saw all day. Along the street is Flourish and Blots, Olivanders, an apothecary, Madame Madkin's Robes and of course Weasley's Wizard Wheezes. You can't actually walk into any of the stores though.

Did you know that for Olivander's shop they created over 2000 wand boxes - each was hand labelled. Also, in Weasley's Wizard Wheezes the props department created over 200 items for sale that would demonstrate the boys' wicked sense of humour. This was by far my favourite set because it has the feel that you have actually stepped along the streets of the wizarding world. My favourite thing on the set is the puking pastels bucket in the door frame of Weasley's. They also sell Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now we move onto the most iconic set of all time. The REAL Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry - they used this for all the wide shots (using green screens to create extra the mountainous background). Perhaps if I show you a picture you will see what I mean...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is obviously not full scale but it is still breath taking and the whole thing would be about the size of two cars side by side with another two cars stacked on top - or maybe even bigger.

 

And that, my friends, brings us to the end of the tour. Except of course, for the gift shop where I tried on the sorting hat for size and left begrudgingly without a wand as they cost £25 each.

 

Harry Potter World is amazing - because it is based so little on the actors and so much on everyone else - the rest of the team that makes the movie and who are often overlooked. For example the animatronics crew, the set designers, the special effects, the visual effects, the props people, the costume and wardrobe and make-up people and so many others.

 

I really loved the fact that they made sure that everything was original and I really don't like the fact that if you look online some people complain about not being able to touch the sets and not being able to get free refills of butter beer - seems greedy to me.

 

p.s. And if you are reading this PEAC class, this was a really good experience which gave me the opportunity to understand more about HP and about all movies. If you ever get the chance to visit - I thoroughly recommend it.

 

 

 

 

Zo-On-The-Go