The staging in the queue is also part of the attraction.
With a budget of 21 million euros, Futuroscope has pulled out all the stops for its new attraction called Tornado Hunter. In addition to the staging of the queue, which is also an integral part of the attraction, the latter is monstrous since it consists of 800 LED screens placed at 360° over 17 meters in diameter and 8 meters high. , not to mention the additional screen made up of 105 modules on the main stage. The 120 spectators are placed in the center, on a motorized platform of 55 tons which turns on itself up to 27 km/h (eight rotations per minute) and tilts on three axes between -20 cm and + 1 meter. We add to this fans, a steam engine for the smoke plunging us inside the tornado and of course the 30 speakers and subwoofers to perfect the atmosphere.
The scene seen by the spectators with the door open on the 4×4.
The same scene seen from behind the scenes above the attraction.
Each of the 800 LED screens displays a definition of 384 x 216 px with a pitch (distance between each pixel) of 2.5 mm. Although high, the pitch is a perfect illusion for spectators who are at least 4 meters from the screen. When you enter the arena, you don’t immediately notice that it’s a giant screen and you almost feel like you’re in a set. Each module can display a peak brightness of 1000 cd/m2, but since the attraction is plunged into darkness, the engineers have chosen to limit the power of the LEDs to 60%, i.e. a peak of around 600 cd/m2.
Magnetic Samsung LED SMD modules are easy to replace.
These are SMD LED screens for System Mount Display produced by Samsung. These Led screens are quite simple, since each diode is placed directly on the printed circuit. There is no protective coating, like the resin that can be seen on the Samsung The Wall Luxury screen for example. Each Led screen measuring 96 x 54 cm is made up of around ten independent panels that are simply fixed using a magnetic system to the main structure. This design makes it very easy to replace a small piece of the screen in the event of a problem with one or more pixels.
In the photo on the left, in the cabinet, you can see the SnowBoxes on the left and the ModuloBoxes in the middle. In the middle photo, the ModuPlayer software which manages the broadcasting of the video stream and in the right image, the amplifiers used to broadcast the audio signal.
Four Modulo Boxes — Windows PCs equipped with Radeon graphics cards — act as video players and send the video stream with a definition of 21,800 x 3 000 px to 16 Snowboxes which generate 15 video streams for the 800 screens and one stream for the main stage screen. The first Master module manages the frame rate to which the other modules are synchronized. We were able to see a few frame drops and the engineers told us that AMD was still working on resolving the issue since the attraction was released last July. Moreover, not all the screens are used permanently since most of the film is made at 220° and only certain scenes are shown at 360°. Finally, a brief word on the attraction’s power supply managed in an independent room with a specific inverter that allows the attraction to operate for about ten minutes, even after a power cut, so that spectators do not find themselves not blocked…
In the end, the attraction lasting a little less than 5 minutes remains impressive without being frightening. It moves, but not too much. In short, it really suits everyone. The problem with big attractions is to be able to accommodate 1,000 people per hour, which is the case with Tornado Hunter with its 120 seats. In low season, the attraction is content with one session every 30 minutes, but in high season, the sessions are linked. However, we remain in line with the other attractions of the park with a giant screen and dynamic seating. Only Objectif Mars, a kind of roller coaster, and Danse avec les robots, where you are shaken by a robotic arm, denote a little of the rest of the attractions which remain mainly on the theme of dynamic cinema. The advantage of this type of attraction is accessibility to a very large audience.
Futuroscope has launched an investment plan of 300 million euros by 2025. Tornado Hunter, at a cost of 21 million euros, is the first attraction of this plan. It will be followed by Mission Bermuda in the spring of 2024. The park also inaugurated the Station Cosmos hotel, designed as a space base, and plans to open an ecolodge next spring.