Prince Caspian is doing some outdoor meet-and-greets as he waits on the opening of the delayed Journey Into Narnia: Prince Caspian exhibit.

As we stated earlier this week, soft-openings of Toy Story Mania are now being conducted on a regular schedule, so expect the attraction to be open from now on, as long as there are no technical difficulties.

Jose managed to get one of the best scores of the day, as you can see by his highlighted score on the leader board.

A sign warns guests that the attraction does not officially open until May 31st and that it may have to close at any time.

A small kiosk outside the Pixar Studios gate is selling some Toy Story Midway Mania merchandise now. Here is the grand opening t-shirt.

Here is the Midway-less hat that is being sold here and at Disney’s California Adventure.

Jose then leaves us with a beautiful night shot of the updated, illuminated Animation Courtyard archway.

The new Journey Into Narnia backdrop is now near the entrance to the exhibit.

The new exhibit features props from The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, which opened in theaters today.

Toy Story Mania is not yet on a full-time running schedule, but is ready at any time to take guests. Some more props are appearing around the Pixar Studios, such as Mr. Spell and the jump rope being used to hoist him up. Toy Story Mania should be on full schedule beginning sometime in the next week, possibly tomorrow. 

For the Narnia series, everything is riding on this weekend and the latest film’s success. If the film doesn’t perform as well as the Walt Disney Company is hoping, we may have seen the last or next-to-last Narnia film. Whether or not that takes place, a decision will be made soon on the now-in-developement Narnia 3-D attraction being planned for Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Disney’s California Adventure. If the film shows strong results, then expect the new Narnia 3-D show to debut at both parks around Summer 2010.

As far as Dr. Jones is concerned, Disney is dying to know if Indy can still swing some good box office numbers after 19 years of script battles between George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. If Indiana Jones does as well as many are expecting it to do, I would expect a green light for the long in development Indiana Jones Adventure (same name as Disneyland attraction, but extremely different beyond that), an updated Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectatular, or both. Be sure to keep an eye on box office results the next two weeks, because the newest attractions at Walt Disney World are riding on it.

Among the features at this year’s Star Wars Weekends, which run every Friday, Saturday and Sunday from June 6 to June 29, 2008, will be “Behind the Force — Experience THE CLONE WARS,” an exploration of the creation of this groundbreaking Star Wars feature film. During “Experience THE CLONE WARS,” fans will get a chance to meet a representative of Lucasfilm Ltd. and, at the culmination of the presentation, see an exclusive clip of STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS that can be seen only at Disney’s Hollywood Studios during Star Wars Weekends.

“The Clone Wars is Star Wars as you’ve never seen it before, so it makes sense that we’re offering fans at Star Wars Weekends something completely unique — an early glimpse at a Star Wars movie,” said Kayleen Walters, director of marketing for Lucasfilm Ltd. “We’re working with Disney to create an event no Star Wars fan will want to miss.”

In addition to the excitement surrounding Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Star Wars will feature celebrities from the classic, live-action movies, who will be on hand each weekend for photos, Q&A, autograph sessions and Hollywood-style motorcades. All four weekends, Star Wars actor Warwick Davis (who portrayed “Wicket” the Ewok) will serve as celebrity emcee and host of the event.

Among the scheduled celebrities and special guests at this year’s Star Wars Weekends are Dave Filoni, director of STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS; and MatthewWood, who performs voices in the movie and the CLONE WARS TV series debuting this fall.

A weekend-by-weekend lineup of celebrities scheduled to appear includes (subject to change):

June 6-8: Jeremy Bulloch (”Boba Fett”) and Daniel Logan (young “Boba Fett”)
June 13-15: Peter Mayhew (”Chewbacca”) and David Prowse (”Darth Vader”)
June 20-22: Amy Allen (”Aayla Secura”) and Matthew Wood (”General Grievous” and voice artist in THE CLONE WARS)
June 27-29: Dave Filoni (director of the upcoming Star Wars: The Clone Wars)
In addition, Lucasfilm Ltd. and Disney’s Hollywood Studios will offer a host of surprises throughout the four weekends, promising to bring an unprecedented level of “sneak preview” excitement and fun to the popular Star Wars Weekends.

Other activities included in the fan-fest fun: the “Padawan Mind Challenge,” allowing kids under 12 to test their wits before the Jedi Council; “Legends of the Force,” a motorcade featuring favorite Star Wars celebrities; and “Jedi Training Academy,” where young Jedi-wannabes can learn lightsaber battle techniques and test theirnewfound skills against Darth Vader or Darth Maul.

Wall-E Spotted in LA! from Blink on Vimeo.

Looks like Disney may have changed the name of the new time-share tower the company is building next to its Contemporary Resort.

“Bay Lake Tower” has replaced “Kingdom Tower” as the name of the project, at least in filings with the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation.

What’s more, earlier this month Disney filed paperwork to create a “Bay Lake Tower at Disney’s Contemporary Resort Condominium Association,” presumably to manage the resort once it is sold off to individual owners. Disney had created a “Kingdom Tower at Disney’s Contemporary Resort Condominium Association” in January.

Disney still has not publicly announced its plans for the partially-built Contemporary addition, which now stands 14 stories and will be linked to the resort’s main A-frame building by a pedestrian bridge. A spokeswoman said the company had nothing to announce today, either. But Disney has indicated in documents submitted to the state that it intends to use the tower for Disney Vacation Club, the company’s Celebration-based time-share arm.

The “Kingdom Tower” name was criticized by some Disney fans when it first surfaced in those documents. Some posters on Internet forums said it evoked religious overtones, noting that “Kingdom Hall” is a term for a place where Jehovah’s Witnesses worship.

“I think a lot of people were drawing comparisons to Kingdom Hall,” said Tim Krasniewski, publisher of DVCNews.com, a website devoted to Disney Vacation Club.

Krasniewski said he was personally fond of “Kingdom Tower,” which most assumed referred to the Magic Kingdom theme park that sits next door to the Contemporary. But he said he likes “Bay Lake Tower” — which refers to one of the lakes that the Contemporary and its addition overlook — even better.

“I think it’s a wonderful name,” he said. “I think everybody’s familiar with Bay Lake, with the fact that Bay Lake is right there. It has a Disney feel to it.”

When The Wave, a new full-service restaurant at Disney’s Contemporary Resort, opens next month, it will boast an unusual wine cellar. Besides stocking no California labels — those wines are available upstairs at the California Grill — the ground-floor restaurant will feature wines of the Southern Hemisphere, including vintages from Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Chile and Argentina.

But that’s not the most unusual aspect. The Wave will offer only wines that have screw caps; no wines with corks will be available. One exception will be sparkling wines, which are not yet available with screw caps. John Blazon, master sommelier and manager of wine sales and standards for Walt Disney World Resort, said he wants “to show middle America that you can enjoy a great bottle of wine despite how it’s sealed.”

Blazon said he has collected 80 wines of various varietals and price points to present at the restaurant’s opening, which is scheduled for June 7. Once considered an indicator of low quality, screw caps, also known as Stelvin closures, have been gaining popularity among premium wine producers for several years as a more reliable means of sealing a bottle of wine.

Plans for the re-branding initiative — which was announced today during the ESPN upfront presentation to advertisers and sponsors — are still in the development stage, but initial concepts involve renaming the sports complex and incorporating the signature elements of ESPN throughout the 220-acre facility, which is a leading venue for amateur and professional sports in the country. The project aims to enhance the experience of both athletes and spectators by connecting them to their favorite ESPN programs, personalities and elements. It also will provide advertisers new sponsorship opportunities at the grass roots level.

“This is a natural and exciting pairing of two powerful brands to create a one-of-a-kind, immersive sports venue that will enable athletes, coaches and guests to experience sports in a whole new way,” said Jay Rasulo, chairman of Disney Parks and Resorts. “This project builds on our collaborative successes and positions us to explore more opportunities with ESPN to create new experiences for guests at Walt Disney World Resort.”

“Our involvement in the Disney sports complex will provide greater opportunities for us to connect directly with athletes, coaches and fans in a highly immersive way,” said George Bodenheimer, president of ESPN Inc. and ABC Sports, and co-chairman of Disney Media Networks. “Our involvement also provides us with a unique and exciting new media platform that will enable our advertisers and sponsors to reach new customers and bring their products and services to life.”

The re-branding of the Disney sports complex is the latest initiative in the growing sports business at Walt Disney World Resort. In December, the sports complex debuted additional outdoor playing fields for football, soccer, lacrosse and field hockey competitions. And this summer the sports complex will open Jostens Center, a new state-of-the-art field house that will allow Disney to accommodate twice as many indoor sports events each year. Additional expansion plans are being explored.

The Disney sports complex annually hosts more than 180 events in 50 different sports involving athletes from more than 70 countries. Among those events are the Atlanta Braves spring training season, a Tampa Bay Rays regular-season series, the Major League Baseball Draft, the NBA Pre-Draft Camp, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers training camp, Chelsea Football Club events, the Pop Warner Super Bowl, AAU National Championships, Varsity All-Star Cheerleading competitions, USSSA events and the Walt Disney World Marathon, one of the top marathons in the nation. ESPN televised 20 sporting events from the complex in the last year. Walt Disney World Resort and ESPN also annually work together to host the popular ESPN The Weekend event at Disney’s Hollywood Studios.

Join Tom Corless and a cast including Jason Diffendal, Luke Manning, Nick McLamb, Justin Heyman, Andy Schalf and John Corigliano for a show that Bridges the Gaps Between You and the World. Sit back, relax, and enjoy all of the Walt Disney World information and fun we have to offer on this silver-screen edition of WDWNT.

To kick off episode 42, Jason Diffendal, Luke Manning, and Nick McLamb join me in discussing the Walt Disney World News and Rumors. This week, we discuss a bunch of news topics from Disney’s Hollywood Studios, including Toy Story Mania fun facts and the new AFI villains exhibit.

Next, it’s the latest edition of Disney Don’t Forget the Lyrics, as listener Andy Schalf takes on reigning champion Luke Manning. This is another entertaining (and funny) edition of our game and should have you on the edge of your seat from start to finish.

Our newest segment, Town Square Talk, is back this week with WDWNT community forum administrator Justin Heyman highlighting the hottest topics being discussed this week. Be sure to get in on these and other exciting discussions by heading over to http://wdwnewstoday.com/forum!!! We also highlight our new video download site with videographer John Corigliano, WDWNTube, featuring tons of great Disney Parks videos. Be sure to check that out at http://wdwntube.wdwnewstoday.com!!!

This episode is also available in an enhanced version. An enhanced podcast is a podcast with added features that standard podcasts don’t have. Enhanced podcasts include many features like Chapter listings, this lets you skip through chapters or see what is in store for this weeks show. Enhanced podcasts also have images to let you differ the chapters by. Enhanced podcasts have one negative feature, you can not play them on most MP3 players. The file format for this is a .m4a which can play on Apple’s iPod and Microsoft’s Zune. You will also need iTunes or Windows Media Player to be able to skip through chapters. If you need or would like the standard edition, download the normal edition listed below this file both on Itunes and in our podcast directory.

To subscribe to the WDW News Today podcast on Itunes, go to this link. If you do not have Itunes, visit our Podcast Download Directory to download or listen to all of our shows

This pin is limited to 2000 and is retailing at $8.95. This pin is only being sold to Walt Disney World Annual Passholders and is available at the Sorcerer’s Hat inside Disney’s Hollywood Studios.

Picture the Manhattan skyline filled with Nike swooshes. Or the golden arches of McDonald’s gently drift ing over Los Angeles.

A special-effects entrepreneur from Alabama has come up with a way to fill the sky with foamy clouds as big as 4 feet across and shaped like corporate logos — Flo gos, as he calls them. Francisco Guerra, who’s also a former magician, developed a ma chine that produces tiny bubbles filled with air and a little helium, forms the foam into shapes and pumps them into the sky.

The Walt Disney Co. will use one of the machines next month to send clouds shaped like Mickey Mouse heads into the air at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Fla., Guerra said.

“It’s a shock factor when you look up and there’s a logo over your head,” said Guerra, whose company, Snowmasters Inc., makes machines that churn out fake snow and foam for Hollywood movies and special events.

He developed Flogos at his small factory in northern Alaba ma — a perfect place for research and development, he said, partly because there aren’t many people around to ask questions about the foam shapes that float above the building on test days.

A Flogo machine works a little like a Play-Doh Fun Factory, the $5 toy kids use to squeeze colorful putty into stars, circles and other shapes.

A boxlike contraption produces a specially formulated white foam in a big round tub and forces it up ward through a stencil. Once the foam is several inches thick, a met al cutter slices it and a faux cloud floats into the sky.

“You want some wind because you want them to travel,” Guerra said. “If there’s no wind they just spiral upward slowly. We’ve got a ghost (stencil), and on a calm day it looks like everyone is going to heaven.” Guerra’s company is working on a version that will spit out 6-foot clouds.

The foam is environmentally safe because it’s mostly water, air and a soapy agent that creates bub bles, Guerra said. Flogos pop just like bubbles and disappear when they hit a tree or building, some times leaving a powdery residue that blows away.

A single Flogo can travel as far as 30 miles and as high as 20,000 feet, Guerra said, and a machine can produce one every 15 seconds. Guerra said he could put a half-dozen machines together and fill the sky with almost any shape a company orders. Imagine a line of drifting Flo gos shaped like the Honda logo leading to a car dealership and you get the idea.

A professor who specializes in environmental issues and public policy said Flogos didn’t sound like a pollution hazard if they’re really just specially formulated soap and water.

“It sounds like it’s harmless, but there’s a lot of stuff that we thought was harmless that turned out not to be,” said Jerry Emison, a professor of political science and public administration and Missis sippi State University.

Kathleen Bergen, a spokes woman for the Federal Aviation Administration in Atlanta, said she had not dealt with the compa ny before but it appears Flogos would fall under FAA rules per taining to events like balloon launches. She said a local FAA of fice would need to be contacted be fore a Flogo launch so that pilots could be notified about it.

The company has lined up in ternational distributors in Aus tralia, Germany, Mexico and Sing apore. A machine rents for about $3,500 a day, Guerra said.

Matt Leible of New York-based Generation Outdoor, an ad agency specializing in outdoor advertis ing, said companies can spend $5,000 a day for a big banner with graphics towed by an airplane, and skywriting can cost $4,500. Want to rent a blimp like Good year’s? That’s $250,000 a month, and companies typically want a six-month minimum, Leible said.

James Twitchell, a professor of English and advertising at the University of Florida, compared Flogos to airplanes pulling ban ners over football games, spot lights with corporate logos and an old imagined scheme to put an ad vertisement into orbit that would be visible at sunset. “It’s been done before. Well, kind of,” Twitchell said in an e-mail interview.

One expert said the idea sounds catchy, but wonders how Flogos will fare against a backdrop of con trolled airspace, environmental sensitivity and concerns over legal liability in case something goes wrong, like a pilot being distracted by a swarm of floating tomahawks above an Atlanta Braves game.

“I think people will look at them. The question is what hap pens after people look at them,” said Leonard M. Lodish, a market ing professor at the Wharton School of the University of Penn sylvania. Lodish said Flogos would no doubt draw attention. But it’s hard to say whether they will be a com mercial success. “The real question is what is the cost benefit versus other alter natives like banners or blimps,” he said. “How many people will see it and what is the impact for those who see it?”

Only a few people have seen Flogos so far, including a crowd at the local ballpark one day when the company was testing. There was no way to ignore the test clouds as they floated lazily over head, said Augie Hendershot, po lice chief in Lexington. “Everybody thought it was neat,” he said.

The World’s Most Valuable Brands

1. Coca-Cola
2. Microsoft
3. IBM
4. GE
5. Nokia
6. Toyota
7. Intel
8. McDonald’s
9. Disney
10. Mercedes-Benz

Best Brands

1. Coca-Cola - 99.8
2. Disney - 99.4
3. Kodak - 99.0
4. Johnson & Johnson - 98.9
5. Microsoft - 97.7
6. Sony - 97.6
7. Wal-Mart 97.6
8. Kelloggs - 97.0
9. Nestle - 95.4

Best Brands Families with Kids

1. Disney - 100.0
2. Johnson & Johnson - 100.0
3. Kodak - 99.9
4. Coke - 99.5
5. Sony - 97.2
6. Microsoft - 96.9
7. Wal-Mart - 96.5
8. McDonald’s 96.3
9. Kellogg’s - 94.3

Disney Brand Equities

1. A Leader - 99.9
2. Friendly - 99.8
3. Authentic - 99.8
4. Fun - 99.6
5. Original - 99.5
6. Cares/Customers - 99.4
7. Innovative - 99.4
8. Unique - 98.7
9. Trustworthy - 94.8

When I get my scanner working later today, I will scan and upload the flyers that I was given while at the show. After the jump, you can find more statitics on Disney products and there consumers.

1. Consumers Spend 11.2 Billion Hours Immersed in Disney Annually
2. 8.4B watching The Disney Channel
3. 800M having fun at Disney theme Parks
4. 140M logged in to Disney.com
5. 40M on Disney Cruise Lines
6. 140M listening to Radio Disney
7. 40M watching Disney Live Shows
8. 500M reading Disney books and magazines
9. 250M playing Disney Video Games
10. 350M watching Disney Movies at home
11. 500M watching Disney Movies at the theatre

An Overwhelming Majority of Adults Purchase Disney Products for Their Households

• 12% Disney Fan - Purchased 14 or more Disney products in the past 12 months; 69% have a child under 13
• 36% Disney Engaged - Purchased 7-13 Disney products in the past 12 months; 45% have a child under 13
• 41% Disney Receptive - Purchased 1-6 Disney products in past 12 months; 22% have a child under 13

Franchise Power (in billions)

1. Disney - 21.0
2. Warner Brothers - 6.0
3. Nickelodean - 5.2
4. Marvel - 5.0
5. Sanrio - 4.2
6. 4 Kids - 2.8
7. HIT - 2.2
8. Universal - 2.0
9. 20th Century Fox - 1.5
10. Pokemon - 1.3
11. Sesame Street 1.25

The World’s Most Valuable Franchise Characters

1. Mickey Mouse & Friends - $5.8
2. Winnie the Pooh & Friends - $5.6
3. Lord of the Rings - $2.9
4. Harry Potter - $2.8
5. Finding Nemo - $2.0
6. Disney Princess - $2.0
7. Yu-gi-oh - $1.6
8. Sponge Bob Square Pants - $1.5
9. Spider-Man - $1.3
10. Wolverine (X-Men) - $0.9
11. Pokemon - $0.8

Awareness (Key Franchises)

• Mickey Mouse - 100%
• Minnie Mouse - 100%
• Donald Duck - 96%
• Goofy - 98%
• Pluto - 95%
• Winnie The Pooh - 97%
• Eeyore - 99%
• Piglet - 99%
• Tigger - 98%
• Cinderella - 95%
• Ariel - 94%
• Snow White - 97%
• Sleeping Beauty - 94%
• Belle - 97%
• Jasmine - 96%

Awareness (Film & Television)

• Stitch - 89%
• Jack Sparrow - 72%
• Mater - 83%
• Lightening McQueen - 86%
• Nemo - 94%
• Troy (HSM) - 56%
• Gabriella (HSM) - 54%
• Simba - 87%
• Woody - 88%
• Zach - 77%
• Cody - 78%
• Hannah Montana - 72%
• Miley - 65%
• London - 72%
• Raven - 74%
• Lilo - 87%
• Kim Possible - 78%

Expect the scans later on today. Enjoy this long, but very informative post!