Audio-animatronics

Audio-animatronics or just animatronics is a form of robotics created by Disney's Imagineers for several shows and attractions at Disney theme parks, and subsequently expanded on and used by other companies. The robots move and make noise, generally speech or song. An animatronic robot is different from an android in that an animatronic works off prerecorded moves and sounds, rather than processing external stimuli and responding to them. Some early examples of audio-animatronics were animals at the Jungle Cruise and a talking version of Abraham Lincoln (both at Disneyland). Current examples include Rex (Star Tours, four Disney parks), Indiana Jones (Indiana Jones Adventure, Disneyland and Tokyo DisneySea), and Tom Morrow (Innoventions, Disneyland).

Related Topics:
Robotics - Disney - Imagineers - Theme parks - Android - Abraham Lincoln - Rex - Star Tours - Indiana Jones - Indiana Jones Adventure - Disneyland - Tokyo DisneySea - Innoventions

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Audio-animatronics were originally a creation of Lee Adams, who started his career with Disney as an electrician at the Burbank studio and was one of Disney's original Imagineers. The first Disney robot with this attribution was the Lincoln Exhibit presented at the 1964 New York World's Fair.

Related Topics:
Imagineers - 1964 New York World's Fair

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Perhaps the most impressive of the early audio-animatronics efforts was The Enchanted Tiki Room (Disneyland Anaheim), where a room full of tropical creatures synchronize eye and facial action with a musical score entirely by electro-mechanical means. The first Disney audio-anamatronic feature in films was the giant squid in the movie 20,000 Leagues under the Sea, also by Lee Adams.

Related Topics:
The Enchanted Tiki Room - 20,000 Leagues under the Sea

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Disney's 1963 animatronics of the Tiki Room robot birds used tones recorded on tape which vibrated a metal reed that closed a circuit to trigger a relay which sent a pulse of electricity to a mechanism that causes a pneumatic valve to move a part of the figure's body (beak, wing, etc.). The artificial audio-animatronic birds' movements were all triggered by sound, hence the prefix 'audio-'. Figures' movements had a neutral "natural resting position" that the limb/part would return to when there was no electric pulse. The movements were all On/Off moves, such as an open/closed eye or beak. On/Off movement was called a digital system.

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Pneumatic muscles were not powerful enough to move larger objects, like an artificial human arm, so hydraulics were used for large figures. On/Off movement would cause an arm to be either up over the artificial man's head (On switch), or down (Off switch), but no movement in between. To create realistic in-between movement in large figures, an analog system was used. The electric signal passed through a 'black box', which emitted different volts to move the hydraulic body part. For example, the higher the voltage, the higher the figure's arm would rise. This gave the figure's limbs/parts a full range of in-between motion, rather than only two positions. The digital system was used with small pneumatic moving limbs (eyelids, beaks, fingers), and the analog system was used for large hydrolic human or animal (arms, heads) moving limbs. http://www.disneypov.com/issue06-7/aa.html

Related Topics:
Hydraulic - Analog - Volt

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The largests animatronic exhibit in DisneyWorld is the Hall of Presidents.

Related Topics:
DisneyWorld - Hall of Presidents

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