This week, we started off the week with a Skype meeting with our client from Give Kids The World (GKTW), Abby. She answered our questions and gave us direction to define our scope. We determined that given their needs, the most important elements in revitalizing their current installation is to be able to control the puppet remotely from an office, install robust controls, make the puppet easy to operate and maintain, fix their current hardware (lights, cameras, speakers, etc.), and set up this hardware in the office.
Rough breakdown of our timeline
As a team, we held a Blue Sky session to brainstorm all possibilities for what shows we could create for Tom Foolery. We found this important to do, as we did not want to forget about storytelling and producing an immersive experience for guests at GKTW. Doing this allowed us to refine our scope, while also keeping in mind what our overall objective is- to make a memorable experience for the kids who visit the village.
In addition to narrowing down our scope, Dustin worked on defining our design pillars for our project, including:
- executable in scope,
- robust engineering controls,
- accessible interface, and
- interactive experience.
We brainstormed design pillars
Identifying these design pillars will enable us to more effectively focus our objectives and plan our deliverables. Given this, we were also able to determine our scope for what show elements to use; the most important show elements to deliver in addition to animatronic functions are lighting, cameras, and audio/speakers.
Our advisor Dave Culyba gave us a breakdown of how Quasi, a past ETC animatronic figure, works and sent us information on its design, function, controls, hardware, and complications. This was extremely helpful for us in getting us to start thinking about what we could implement into our project.
Raisa worked with our ETC Coordinator, Janice, to theme the project room, including going through ETC prop supplies and sending out order requests. The theme of our room is an enchanted forest, alluding to the forest theme at the Castle of Miracles at the village. Josh and Atul created a working prototype of a robotic head, using a three degree of freedom joint, a hobby microcontroller, and a servo-motor. Niharika continued to work on branding for our project, creating sketches of the logo and poster. Alex researched hardware and technology used in animatronic figures, analyzing which might be best for our project scope.
Starting our room theming
Dustin worked with Janice to book our first site visit with GKTW and will be visiting the village from Feb 1st-4th. During this time, we will meet with Abby, observe how the space is used and how guests currently interact with it, and take photos and measurements of the space. Additionally, we will visit Walt Disney World to do observational research on similar experiences such as Turtle Talk with Crush and Mobile Muppet Lab. Dave Culyba has also helped us schedule a meeting with Tim Ecke, an Imagineer in Show Systems that developed the technology used in articulated costume design.
As a team, we brainstormed questions that we would need to be answered during our site visit and assigned responsibilities to each team member to do while at the village. We found this preparation to be vital to our research and important to streamline efficiency.