Things you didn’t know about Disney!

Although the body proportions for Belle and Ariel may look too good to be true, they were actually based on real-life model Sherri Stoner. Even her mannerisms were adopted for the characters by the illustrators, which is why Ariel bites her lip and Belle often brushed her hair from her face

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A lot of early Disney classical characters do not have a mother, such as The Jungle Book, Pinocchio, and Bambi. It has been suggested that this was due to the guilt that Walt felt over the death of his own mother in 1938. With the success of Snow White, he had bought a home for his parents, however, Flora Disney, tragically died from a faulty heating system in their new home, leading to carbon monoxide poisoning.

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As you may have noticed from films such as Frozen and The little Mermaid, Disney animators like to hide what's known as 'easter eggs' in the films, such as other characters in background scenes

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For a few years, Disney held the patent for technicolour, making him the only animator allowed to make coloured films

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When Disney World Florida opened in 1971, Walt was unsettled by the site of characters having to run through different lands which they did not belong to get to their own 'world'. He felt that this spoiled the magic, so to solve this, Walt designed an underground tunnel system which allowed characters to magically arrive in the appropriate place without ruining the illusion

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Walt Disneys real last name is d'lsigny, showing his French roots. Although d'lsignyland doesn't have much of a ring to it, Walt did lend some French influence to films such as The Aristocrats and Ratatouille.

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The theme parks use a patented 'Smellitzer' device designed to pump certain scents around. Whether it's a waft of sea salt in Pirates of the Caribbean, or vanilla in Main Street, all your senses are constantly being tantalised.

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Some of the architecture at Disneyland has been made to appear taller than it actually is. It is design uses 'forced perspective', so although Cinderella's castle may seem to rise up into the clouds, it is actually only 189ft tall. This effect is due to painted bricks that get smaller towards the top

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If your wondering which main characters are the quietest, look no further - Dumbo wins the top prize. This little elephant is the only character that says absolutely nothing during the entire film. This is followed closely by Aurora from Sleeping Beauty, who only gets 18 whole lines of dialogue and just 18 minutes of screen time in her own film. Well, that's what you get for sleeping through it!

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