Eddie Sotto's take on the current state of the parks (Part II)

KevinYee

KevinYee

Well-Known Member
Garner Holt just started a column at MiceChat. This got me thinking. To what extent do designers get "in the weeds" on the technical end? I know you generally have an interest and appetite for all kinds of knowledge, and loved your story about how (and why) you learned to do voice work. How does this play out for you with the technology toys?
 
Eddie Sotto

Eddie Sotto

Premium Member
KevinYee said:
Garner Holt just started a column at MiceChat. This got me thinking. To what extent do designers get "in the weeds" on the technical end? I know you generally have an interest and appetite for all kinds of knowledge, and loved your story about how (and why) you learned to do voice work. How does this play out for you with the technology toys?
Click to expand...

I grew up loving James Bond and all those gadgets, not to mention the book on Pirates they sold that showed WED and how Pirates were made. A must own.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Walt-Disney...ultDomain_0&hash=item231d1b8bf6#ht_500wt_1259

My father took a few shots at inventions and things like that, so our family has that "nothing is impossible" kind of atmosphere. I think if POTC was done with live talent I would not loved it nearly as much. That fact that it is one massive Emporium animated display window (with boats in it!) blew me away. When I was 12 I tried to build my own Tiki Bird and soon realized I was in way over my head. I have great respect for creative engineers.

At work it's helpful. Usually it's enough to have a good instinct as to how feasible something is or visualize the result. You end up assimilating lots of information and see what solutions work well and which ones don't. You get told "you'll never see that speaker" and you later learn that you will and it's big and painted black. In AA stuff you end up buying figures by the "move" so you have to have a sense how many "moves" (eye blink, head turn, arm lift, etc) gets your figure to come to life. At times you cannot afford every move so you get strategic. Fans complain about voices from static figures. I guess that was not enough "moves".

Technology helps or hurts you if used in a lame way, so you end up having to know how things are done, not to tell engineers how to build it so much, but sometimes to be sure they are not just doing things the same old way, or challenging them to explore better options. As Walt demonstrated, you want to be curious as to how things work so you can better visualize using those tools in new ways and combinations.

I left the company to reinvent myself in telling stories with technology and that paid off as we are working in that field now.
 
Eddie Sotto

Eddie Sotto

Premium Member
Re-treadding Luigis.

We were discussing being too ambitious about maintaining and designing effects that end up not working or not meeting expectation. The same is true of ride systems. I did not anticipate Mission:Space ever needing a spin and non-spin option. That ended up ok, thank goodness.

Now to DCA. I've been reading about how exit reviews of "Luigi Flying Tires" ride are causing the team to "gin up" last minute fun that the ride system does not seem to be providing, with beach balls, longer ride time, dialog and peppy music. Yikes! At this point, you're kind of in a corner. It's cake decorating.

Unless some kind of limitation in the ride system came up last minute for safety or other reasons that killed the fun, you would think they would have known how "fun or not fun" the ride was going to be ages ago when they tested the vehicles. Who knows? Rides Happen. From what I read online in MiceAge it's not even intuitive to the guest. So you don't know how to steer it, meaning your time is up by the time you do, and when you do know, it's reportedly slow and dull, so they add music and other objects to make it seem lively. I think one of the primary issues may be that "Flying Saucers" when they are funnest are omnidirectional bumper cars, and Disney lawyers hate bumper car type rides. Period. So going down that path, when you know they will scrub out any shred of meaningful teenage bumping is perhaps not worth pursuing. I guess what I'm saying is that you want to anticipate where the creative risks are and the odds of it getting dumbed down and not being as cool as the rendering. We can get seduced by the engineers and ourselves looking at tests, or miss the simple things like how the guest will use it. Most guests don't pay attention to signs and dialog. Some things are just not going to happen in the Disney Empire. If the intent is to just glide around and chase beach balls, fine. My fear would be that comparison to real bumper cars as that's how the guest perceives them. I hope they pull it off, as it is really late in the game to be in that kind of a creative jam. I will say that the music on the "Silly Symphony Swings" makes all the difference and is a powerful tool.

Let's hope they "enhance" their way out of it.
 
lazyboy97o

lazyboy97o

Well-Known Member
In some ways I think the issues with Luigi's Flying Tires may be a result of the secretive nature of design within themed entertainment. It would be easy for the design crew to attribute their learning curves to the roughness of the prototypes they were working with. By the time the developed the final model, they were very familiar with the system and its operations. The number of people unattached to the project who were coming in is likely very small. Sometimes you need those unattached, outside eyes to come in, take a look and give you a kick for doing something stupid.

Another aspect of it may be getting too caught up in nostalgia. Disney has not been shy about connecting Luigi's Flying Tires to the Flying Saucers.
 
Eddie Sotto

Eddie Sotto

Premium Member
lazyboy97o said:
Another aspect of it may be getting too caught up in nostalgia. Disney has not been shy about connecting Luigi's Flying Tires to the Flying Saucers.
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A good point. When you compare the two rides, the Saucers seemed more nimble and had a smaller footprint. There is a old Saucer clip that shows them with beach balls, but I think that was for PR purposes. When i was acid on them I just remember not getting it to go very far because of gridlock. You kind of just went a short distance and then it was over.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhSpWQt9_-c

I just saw this Lassiter promo video and it looks pretty good, but you can tell the video is speeded up in some places.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDNT-UmvuLA&feature=player_embedded
 
AEfx

AEfx

Well-Known Member
Eddie Sotto said:
You make a good point. There are a huge number of projectors in that ride and from a tuning and maintenance point of view, I'd imagine you'd really have to stay on top of things to keep the magic alive. As a designer, you have to be realistic about what you are asking for in the long term as you could end up watching effects get pulled out or stray from adjustment if you make it too complex.
Click to expand...

Besides that, it's also...the subs are just uncomfortable. Unless you are a certain height (not too short, not too tall) it's very difficult to hunch yourself over to look out those tiny portholes.

It's no mystery why they reused the original subs - mainly to save money and to avoid any ADA compliance issues (as they are grandfathered, and one has to not only have two working legs, but be rather nimble to make it around those tiny little winding steps, to board). But to be honest, as much as I loved seeing the lagoon full and the subs kinetic energy added to the area, it's almost a waste because of it.

And I completely agree with the other poster - the effect is MUCH better done at WDW. Our Nemo ride here is better overall than theirs - the only thing they have going for it is the "really for real" underwater aspect.
 
The Empress Lilly

The Empress Lilly

Well-Known Member
Eddie Sotto said:
Now to DCA. I've been reading about how exit reviews of "Luigi Flying Tires" ride are causing the team to "gin up" last minute fun that the ride system does not seem to be providing, with beach balls, longer ride time, dialog and peppy music. Yikes! At this point, you're kind of in a corner. It's cake decorating.

Unless some kind of limitation in the ride system came up last minute for safety or other reasons that killed the fun, you would think they would have known how "fun or not fun" the ride was going to be ages ago when they tested the vehicles.
Click to expand...
Why would I want to ride flying tires when there's no purpose to it? I want to bump others. Or do a parcours. Or pretend I'm a hovercraft doing an amphibious landing.

How much fun is a ball in the park without a game? You can only throw it back and forth so many times. Add any game however, and you have infinite fun.

I say paint half the tires as as Tie-fighters (Tire-Fighter?) and the other half as X-Wings. Add fixed Buzzlike lasers. Then shoot each other. If after two minutes the X-Wings have won a Deathstar gets blown up.
 
bcoachable

bcoachable

Well-Known Member
Eddie-
I am an old football coach... All week long, you practice plays vs a scout team defense. Then you get to see the results play out on Friday nights...
Sometimes plays we would come up with really worked well, and then other times they would just flop...
After a game there is always discussion about all that went on (good and bad) during the previous games 4 quarters.
Good natured (much more so after a win) ribbing will occur for anyone whose plays flopped...
I've wondered how this scenario might play out inside WED after a ride opens to the public... Any inside stories?
 
Eddie Sotto

Eddie Sotto

Premium Member
ParentsOf4 said:
:lol:

Since you mention it, what is your opinion of WDW's current maintenance budget?
Click to expand...

I have not seen it. There are lots of things going on at WDW. I think they are probably doing what they can. Kevin has his show list of show related things that need to be addressed. Maybe it has to do with staffing or engineering more than just money, as they do spend lots on rehabs like on Main Street.
 
Eddie Sotto

Eddie Sotto

Premium Member
tfrog said:
Eddie-
I am an old football coach... All week long, you practice plays vs a scout team defense. Then you get to see the results play out on Friday nights...
Sometimes plays we would come up with really worked well, and then other times they would just flop...
After a game there is always discussion about all that went on (good and bad) during the previous games 4 quarters.
Good natured (much more so after a win) ribbing will occur for anyone whose plays flopped...
I've wondered how this scenario might play out inside WED after a ride opens to the public... Any inside stories?
Click to expand...

Usually there was a "lessons learned" meeting where you kind of lick your wounds and see how to improve the process of review, budget, anticipating costs, etc. As you point out, you discuss good and bad. There are discussions about how you didn't really save anything by reusing design because it got redrawn anyway, or that "fast tracking" cost more and there were lots of mistakes. Improve coordination between the engineering and show design groups, etc. The most frequent error from my days was, the outside firm to do the working drawings was hired too early before creative was done, so their hours were spent prematurely when they should not have been brought in till the idea was solidified. Stuff like that. Rarely does anyone gets fired either.

In today's WDI, it seems that John Lassiter comes in and compiles his own "hit list" of what the show needs and they get out their wallet and do it. That's great. Mermaid got new hair this week and lots of fixes, and it seems Luigi is getting the same "make it right" treatment. He went into the Nemo Subs ride early on and spent a fortune getting that show up it's current standard. I think this is the best way, as they are out there fixing the show right away versus just saying, "we goofed and this is why it's lame" and leaving it alone. John is no doubt learning what mistakes were due to inexperience, budget cuts, or lack of oversight, etc. and which ones were unavoidable. Once he learns the ropes of ride design, then he will be able to anticipate these issues in his own reviews of the proposed work before they get built.
 
bcoachable

bcoachable

Well-Known Member
Sounds like a very similar process in our field too... :)
Except for the fired part.... lol
but to some degree in our buisness, if you are good at fixing what is broke before it hurts the game's outcome you get to keep your job.
And maybe the fact that we are working with teenagers, you guys are working with cantancarous AA's... (possibly the same thing?? :) )
 
Eddie Sotto

Eddie Sotto

Premium Member
The art of this whole thing is to see things coming and head them off before they get set in stone. The best way I know of is to forget being the designer. Imagine every nanosecond you can as the guest going through the show. Start with what the expectation is that you've set up and how to exceed it. What they feel, what they look at first, what they have been led to believe by the previous scene, their average age, what would seem magical, and what are you building them up to!

Designers think the guest will love the pretty design, writers think they will actually pay attention to the dialog, engineers think they will notice how smooth the track is. In fact, you experience it all at once and have a collective thought about it. Some sensations overpower others, lighting takes your eye to certain places, etc. The designer has to ride herd on all of that and "sculpt" the experience in to a total vision. You need to know the audience too. So you want to wait in the line and listen to the guests, watching what they are doing in pre-shows and how much they don't care or even hear the dialog, or read the little story based signs. That does not mean it should not be there, but what do you expect them to know. You cannot assume they will read or know how to drive a "Luigi tire", but you can design an interface that looks like something else they've used (like a steering wheel) so it's use is obvious as you can leverage all the times they've "steered" before. Autopia cars are intuitive because they are an analog to something we know. The learning curve is less. Stuff like that.
 
bcoachable

bcoachable

Well-Known Member
Eddie Sotto said:
The art of this whole thing is to see things coming and head them off before they get set in stone. The best way I know of is to forget being the designer. Imagine every nanosecond you can as the guest going through the show. Start with what the expectation is that you've set up and how to exceed it. What they feel, what they look at first, what they have been led to believe by the previous scene, their average age, what would seem magical, and what are you building them up to!

Designers think the guest will love the pretty design, writers think they will actually pay attention to the dialog, engineers think they will notice how smooth the track is. In fact, you experience it all at once and have a collective thought about it. Some sensations overpower others, lighting takes your eye to certain places, etc. The designer has to ride herd on all of that and "sculpt" the experience in to a total vision. You need to know the audience too. So you want to wait in the line and listen to the guests, watching what they are doing in pre-shows and how much they don't care or even hear the dialog, or read the little story based signs. That does not mean it should not be there, but what do you expect them to know. You cannot assume they will read or know how to drive a "Luigi tire", but you can design an interface that looks like something else they've used (like a steering wheel) so it's use is obvious as you can leverage all the times they've "steered" before. Autopia cars are intuitive because they are an analog to something we know. The learning curve is less. Stuff like that.
Click to expand...

With all of this input and thinking and planning (practice), how can WDI come up with something like the Narnia experience (bad play)? I would think that they had to see how the guest (players/fans) would wonder "what a waste of time (play calling) that was". Or does Upper level management (the Head Coach) sometimes say "this is what we are going to do" and then Imagineers (Offensive Coordinators) are forced to come up with something that they know is going to "loose yards" so to speak...
And while we are here... any guesses to what was going on with the Imagineering of the Stich thing???
 

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