{"id":94261,"date":"2014-11-07T20:52:34","date_gmt":"2014-11-08T01:52:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/?p=94261"},"modified":"2014-11-07T20:53:46","modified_gmt":"2014-11-08T01:53:46","slug":"fans-welcomed-by-smaug-at-wellington-airport","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/2014\/11\/07\/94261-fans-welcomed-by-smaug-at-wellington-airport\/","title":{"rendered":"Fans welcomed by Smaug at Wellington Airport"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"intro\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www-images.theonering.org\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/Smaug-Unveiling.jpg\" class=\"no-lazyload\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-94264 no-lazyload\" src=\"http:\/\/www-images.theonering.org\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/Smaug-Unveiling.jpg\" alt=\"Smaug Unveiling\" width=\"317\" height=\"211\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/Smaug-Unveiling.jpg 800w, https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/Smaug-Unveiling-300x199.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/Smaug-Unveiling-600x399.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 317px) 100vw, 317px\" \/><\/a>Winners of the Hobbit Fan Contest were treated to a surprise when they visited Wellington Airport Thursday, ahead of their special screening of <em>The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies<\/em>. Sir Richard Taylor was on hand to unveil a massive sculpture of Smaug (specifically his head &#8211; measuring 4.25 metres from front to back) to the 200 lucky fans.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>The unveiling is captured in the Fan Contest video below (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=nS_Ay7kubTc\" target=\"_blank\">Real Middle-earth Diary 5<\/a>), and you can see the fans&#8217; reactions as Smaug is revealed complete with opening eyelids and smoke emitting from his nostrils.<\/p>\n<p><center><iframe data-src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/nS_Ay7kubTc\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" class=\"lazyload\" data-load-mode=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/center><br \/>\nThe eyes themselves were accomplished through the use of an animatronic latex and polyurethane foam mechanism with a rear projection eyeball. Speaking to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.3news.co.nz\/entertainment\/hobbit-fans-get-first-glimpse-of-smaug-at-wellington-airport-2014110612\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>3 News<\/strong><\/a>, Taylor referred to the character of Smaug as &#8220;the ultimate creation of Tolkien&#8217;s imagination&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Taylor:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>&#8220;Having a chance to bring this creature into Wellington Airport, along with other characters we have done, was an opportunity not to be missed.&#8221;<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Wellington Airport also offered a wonderful glimpse at the construction of the project through this time-lapse video, courtesy of their <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=80pjNuBeUMI\" target=\"_blank\">YouTube<\/a> page.<\/p>\n<p><center><iframe data-src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/80pjNuBeUMI\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" class=\"lazyload\" data-load-mode=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/center><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Winners of the Hobbit Fan Contest were treated to a surprise when they visited Wellington Airport Thursday, ahead&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2199,"featured_media":94262,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2616,197,2667,4,153,495,74,77,148,2490,789,104],"tags":[2094,2677,1313,221,2312],"class_list":["post-94261","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fan-fellowship-contest","category-fans","category-hobbit-fan-contest","category-hobbit-movie","category-tolkien-life","category-miscellaneous","category-jackson","category-taylor","category-hobbit","category-the-hobbit-the-battle-of-five-armies","category-weta-cave-production","category-production-weta-workshop","tag-battle-of-the-five-armies","tag-fan-contest","tag-smaug","tag-the-hobbit","tag-wellington-airport"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/smaug.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1tLoH-owl","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=94261"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94261\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":94293,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94261\/revisions\/94293"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/94262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=94261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=94261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=94261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}