In a world in which Disney defines its brand and the content it releases under its own name as being aimed at the broadest possible audience, Mickey Mouse is known largely as a feel-good, happy-go-lucky cartoon character.
But that's not how Mickey was in the early days. Back in 1928, when he first hit the world stage, he was a very badly behaved mouse. And now, one of the best-known video game designers in the world wants to bring back a little of bit of Mickey's dark side.
And he'll get his chance to make that a reality. Warren Spector, the game designer behind the Deus Ex franchise, is working on a new game, Disney's Epic Mickey, which is being positioned, in part, as a "re-imagining" of Mickey Mouse.
Planned for a fall 2010 release, Disney's Epic Mickey will be an adventure-platforming game exclusively for Nintendo's Wii. The story is built around a world--crafted by the sorcerer from The Sorcerer's Apprentice--in which a series of forgotten Disney creations live, and thrive. Among those characters is Oswald, Walt Disney's earliest cartoon star. As the years pass and Oswald becomes bitter at Mickey's success, Mickey inadvertently destroys Oswald's comfort zone in the cartoon wasteland and he must face the consequences of what he has accidentally wrought.
"It's a game where we remind (people) that Mickey is a hero who solves problems by dynamically changing the world around him and deciding how to interact with the people and places and problems he encounters in this strange new world," Spector said.
In 2005, Spector formed a start-up, Junction Point, which Disney bought when it commissioned him to work on the Mickey Mouse game. "I've wanted to work for Disney forever," he said, "so that was not a stumbling point for me at all."
And because Spector is a lifelong Disney fan and animation "freak," everything came together in 2007 for him and his Junction Point team to take on perhaps the best-known cartoon character of all time. On Tuesday, Spector talked with CNET News about the project.
Q: How did you get involved?
Warren Spector: I was out pitching a near-future science-fiction game and an enormous epic fantasy role playing game, and my agent suggested we talk to Disney. They turned things around and asked me if I wanted to a Mickey Mouse game, and I told them no, because I don't do kids games and Mickey's been kind of a kid property for a long time. But they said, No, no, we want someone to bring Mickey to a gaming audience in a whole new way and make him a hero for the 21st century. Pretty much at that point, I was in.
What was it like to get a chance to re-imagine Mickey Mouse?
Spector: How often do you get a chance to work with the most recognizable movie star character property on Earth? That's an opportunity most people never get. There was pretty much no way I could say no. Mickey touches everybody, and none of us will ever meet a human being who doesn't know about this character.
What's the best-case outcome for this game, in your fantasy?
Spector: The best case is to change the way people think about Mickey Mouse. He's not just your 8-year-old kid's best buddy, or a character who teaches infants colors on Mickey's Clubhouse. He's a hero again. In his early days, he appealed to every body. From 1928 to the mid-1930s, moviegoers around the world, everybody, men, women, old, young, you name it. Everybody loved Mickey. And the opportunity to bring him back to that place, where he's not just an icon on a watch or a T-shirt, but is actually a character that people care about in a narrative context, or want to be, to look up to as a character whose skin they want to inhabit for awhile, Boy, I can't think of a better (challenge) for someone who tells stories and makes games for a living.
The logo for Disney's Epic Mickey.
(Credit: Disney Interactive Studios)
Why does Mickey need re-imagining? And why now?
Spector: There's these characters, like Mario and Link (from the Zelda games) and Sonic, and I don't know if it's true, but you've got to believe that those characters--who are three heads tall and cute and iconic--at some level were inspired by Mickey Mouse. So why shouldn't Mickey be at the top of the gaming heap? Mickey deserves to be at the top of the game hero pyramid.
What are some of the things you're doing to make this new Mickey recognizable for everyone?
Spector: I came into this with a pretty good idea of who Mickey was. I wanted to remind Mickey that it's okay to be mischievous and badly-behaved. For so many years, he hasn't been allowed to do anything remotely mischievous. But if you go back to those early cartoons, he was very badly behaved, and we've got to let him get back to that. And in his early cartoons, he was very cartoon-y, he squashed, he stretched. He could remove his tail and use it as a sword. That was the second thing. And the third leap was mischievous cartoon character made of paint. So we talked about what we could do if we gave Mickey control over the stuff that he's made of and let him paint and then use paint thinner to remove stuff.
Were there other things that were essential for bringing Mickey to this medium?
Spector: One major challenge was finding a look for him, especially a 3D look. With a couple of rare exceptions, Mickey's always been in 2D and the animators cheated all the time, with the way his ears work and the way his nose fits relative to the rest of his face. In 3D you can't do that, so I looked at the few previous 3D Mickeys and I didn't feel anybody had gotten it right. We went through probably thousands of concepts trying to find the right look.There are a lot of people at Disney who care a lot about Mickey Mouse, and so getting a look that people could get behind was tough. Rendering it in 3D was tough and then getting it to move like a cartoon character was a huge challenge and tons of fun, and you'll tell me if we succeeded.
Warren Spector, lead designer on Epic Mickey.
(Credit: Disney Interactive Studios)
How much control did you have and how much control Disney assert?
Spector: I was really worried about that when I first started on this. There are lines you don't cross with Mickey Mouse, OK? But the thing that surprised me was how far out those lines were and how obvious it is where the lines really are.
There are people who say, 'Oh, give Mickey a big knife and put a gun in his hand, and then I'll like him.' Well, come on, nobody's going to do that. And you're not going to make Mickey evil, you know? And when you have an icon, where any combination of three circles defines Mickey Mouse for most people on the planet, you're not going to make his head square. I'd say it was a pretty easily negotiated deal, creatively.
Talk more about where the story idea came from?
Spector: During a meeting with the Disney guys, they showed us a PowerPoint with the concept of cartoon wasteland, a world of rejected and forgotten Disney creativity. And the foundation was making Mickey relevant to a gaming audience and a modern audience. It was funny because I watched this presentation thinking, Holy Cow, this is phenomenal and the seed of an amazing thing. And then all the execs were saying, Oh, you don't have to use any of that, this is just our think tank's concept. And I'm sitting there, going, Are you guys crazy. That's a great idea. Why would I not use all of that? I just thought it was so funny because they were trying so hard to make it clear that I had all this creative freedom, and I was like, No, I don't want it, I want this as my starting point.
Can you tell me something about working with these famous Disney characters that would surprise us?
Spector: I think the thing that surprised me the most is how easy it is to get these characters almost right. It's like, drawing Mickey or any other character in the Disney archives, they are so well known and defined and recognized and have such strong personalities that getting them 90 percent right is very easy. But that last 10 percent that just nails them, that's really, really hard. And that goes for how they look, and how they act and how they move, which is one of the reasons why I was so proud of my animators. I didn't tell them to do this. They came up with this idea on their own, of going back to the old cartoons, and rotoscoping them. They took the old cartoons and took our model and rig and then duplicated classic 2D animation, and composited our guy into classic Disney 2D cartoons. When you couldn't tell if it was our model or the original 2D animation, that was when I knew we had it.
Why only the Wii?
Spector: At the beginning, it was supposed to be on all platforms. I remember vividly how nervous I was about that. The idea was we were going to do a Wii port and I was never comfortable with that because the Wii really deserves its own design, something that takes advantage of what the Wii does best. We were talking about this one day and (Disney Interactive Studios executive vice president) Graham Hopper basically said, What does it take to ensure quality? I said, you can never guarantee greatness, but you need enough time and money to be competitive and it helps if you can focus. A single platform would be great. And it was an easy step from there to, Hey, we should do a Wii exclusive.
What about the Wii "stalling?" Does that worry you at all?
Spector: Yes and no. I've been doing this for 20 years, and I've had this saying, That I just need to sell one more copy of a game than is necessary to get my publisher to fund my next one. So I'm looking at this as, I've got a responsibility to Mickey Mouse and to Disney, and if I do something really good, commercial success will follow. I've got to believe that. And once you start talking about painting, people's hands (on the Wii) just immediately start moving as if they're holding a brush. It just totally works. I think we're on the right platform.
CNET News reporter Daniel Terdiman takes a ride in a flying armchair. The chair is suspended underneath what is known as a balloon cluster, and the ride took place at the Emeryville, Calif., headquarters of Pixar Animation.
(Credit: Raquel Baldwin)EMERYVILLE, Calif.--You might think sitting in a flying armchair would be a blood-pumping, adrenaline-rushing, and terrifying pastime. But I'm here to tell you that it's pretty darn smooth sailing.
I know because on Friday morning, I got a chance to take a ride on, yes, a flying armchair. And while I didn't crash it into power cables or cause a major blackout like Larry Walters, aka "Lawnchair Larry", I did take some serious air.
This was a rare opportunity to take part in what I suppose is the little-known sport of cluster ballooning. Ultimately, it was part of a high-flying promotion for the forthcoming Pixar animated film "Up."
"Up" hits theaters on May 29. As IMDB puts it, "By tying thousands of balloons to his home, 78-year-old Carl Fredricksen sets out to fulfill his lifelong dream to see the wilds of South America. Right after lifting off, however, he learns he isn't alone on his journey, since Russell, a wilderness explorer 70 years his junior, has inadvertently become a stowaway on the trip."
According to Disney spokesperson Raquel Baldwin, "Up," Pixar's tenth feature film, and the first done in Disney digital 3D, included 20,622 hand-animated balloons that Fredricksen uses to hoist his house aloft. Of course, Baldwin added, researchers at Pixar discovered it would actually take several million normal-size balloons to get much lift on a house.
Still, what better way to promote such a film than to hire two world-class cluster balloonists (Troy Bradley and Jonathan Trappe) to conduct simultaneous tours around the American West and East, respectively, giving local media rides in an armchair suspended from dozens of huge, brightly colored balloons.
I arrived at Pixar's campus here at about 5:15 a.m. Friday, just as a woman named Devony Corry, a longtime commercial hot-air balloon pilot, was holding onto one of the large, helium-filled balloons. It was clipped onto and tugging insistently at a belt loop on her pants. "This is what we need for guys who wear their pants too low," she joked, adding, "I'm just afraid it's going to rip the belt loop off my pants."
The armchair is seen in the early-morning light, before being rigged up to the balloon cluster.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)Here in Emeryville, Bradley (who along with Richard Abruzzo, became the first two people to fly a balloon nonstop from North America to Africa) is in charge of a group of about 10 or so people who are rapidly filling the large balloons with helium and clipping them into a quickly-growing cluster.
"We're hoping we'll lose a few people for good footage," Bradley joked as I arrived.
At this point, with the sky still in its pre-dawn state, Bradley and his crew had gotten the cluster to just 13 balloons. But he said the ultimate goal was to reach between 64 and 70 balloons, which, combined, will contain about 8,000 cubic feet of helium and have about 500 pounds of lift.
For now, the 13 balloons (which quickly become 14, then 15, 16, and so on as team members clip new ones onto the cluster) are tethered to two giant helium tanks. A brown armchair rests on the ground next to the tanks, seemingly calling out to take someone skyward.
As the sky begins to take on a little color, it's clear we're going to be blessed with a spectacular day complete with what Bradley calls "absolutely awesome conditions." Read: no wind.
At the core of the cluster is a small set of 8-1/2-foot balloons, around which are being added a set of 7-footers. Later, the cluster will be filled out with a large number of 5-footers.
As she holds on to one of the 7-footers, I chat with Corry, who tells me she's been piloting hot air balloons for more than 25 years. She said she had learned about the cluster ballooning event here by reading an e-mail chain inviting qualified folks to "come out and crew."
After awhile, the cluster is getting too big to remain tethered to the helium tanks, and Bradley and a couple of helpers carefully clip it to the armchair. But because of the lift from the cluster, it's necessary to seat someone in the chair, and so a woman named Carol Bair takes the plunge. Still, the cluster of balloons is testing Bair's weight. "He (Bradley) said the chair tips forward and I don't have my seat belt on yet," Bair joked.
One by one, team members arrive from helium tanks arrayed around the amphitheater here where the event is being held, ready to help add to the girth and wild colors of the cluster. There's actually a queue, as it's faster to fill a balloon, it seems, than to clip one on to the cluster.
"I can't afford to lose any weight," Bair said. "I have to be ballast."
The balloon cluster begins to take air as it approaches completion. At its base is an armchair in which Carol Bair sits patiently.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)Indeed, as a couple more balloons are clipped in, Bair gives a little shout and we can see the foot of the chair begin to move around on its own: Armchairs suspended from cluster balloons clearly have a need to take to the sky.
Carol's husband, Ray Bair, is another member of Bradley's traveling team. The three of them, plus two others, have come from Albuquerque, N.M., and have hit cities like Chicago, Cincinnati, Seattle, and St. Louis with the promotional balloon cluster on their way to Pixar. Bair tells me a cluster like this is intended to look like a lightbulb, though "it's a little different every time."
As the early morning sun crested the trees near the entrance to Pixar's campus, the balloons become brightly lit and, with the sky a brilliant blue and the balloons' various colors almost glowing, it looks absolutely glorious.
"It looks like a perfect morning," Carol Bair said.
"Oh yeah," Bradley answered, "You can't ask for better."
Taking air
The plan was that at 8 a.m., the balloon team would be done and could start giving journalists rides in the flying armchair. There were a lot of other reporters who had signed up for the privilege, but none of them had gotten to Pixar at 5:15. So I got to go first (see the video below).
I sat down in the chair and several people began strapping me in, even as two people sat on the arms to keep the cluster, the chair, and me from flying away. The wind began to pick up a little, and I could feel the chair sliding around a little bit underneath me. Just then, Baldwin handed me a waiver to sign. I joked I'd sign it when the ride was over.
Finally, we were ready, and the chair began to rise. It was smooth, almost surreally so. If I hadn't known what was going on, I wouldn't have known what was going on. They let me rise up to about 30 feet in the air, and then say a few words into a small microphone attached to my shirt, since they were filming the whole thing.
In fact, because there were already a bunch of other reporters lined up to take an armchair flight, the ride lasted just a few minutes. I would have liked to go up much higher--maybe not as high as 20,000 feet, what I understand is the rig's limit, but a little higher. But oh, well. Beggars can't be choosers.
I touched down, just as quietly and smoothly as I'd taken off, and then, just like that it was over.
You can call me "Flying Armchair Daniel." Or maybe something a little catchier than that.
On June 22, Geek Gestalt will kick off Road Trip 2009. After driving more than 12,000 miles in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest and the Southeast over the last three years, I'll be looking for the best in technology, science, military, nature, aviation and more in Colorado, Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana and South and North Dakota. If you have a suggestion for someplace to visit, drop me a line. And in the meantime, join the Road Trip 2009 Facebook page and follow my Twitter feed.
For a certain kind of geek, there's no more important film than Disney's 1982 cult hit "Tron."
The story about a man trapped inside a computer who must continually fight for his life by riding light-bikes across a digital playground didn't do so well at the box office but gained a massive following in the years since.
Now, Disney is working on "Tron 2.0," a sequel to the original, and word is that the studio has chosen Daft Punk, the French electronica duo that is itself a cult favorite, to write the score for the film.
That's according to the Upcoming Film Scores blog, which reported the news Wednesday, saying it had received confirmation from Disney.
The new film, which will star Jeff Bridges in the lead role--reprising his turn as the man trapped in the computer in the original--will be directed by Joseph Kosinski, according to IMDb. It is slated for a 2011 release.
Jeff Bridges, of course, is no stranger to being the star of cult films, having also played The Dude, aka Jeffrey Lebowski, in the Coen Brothers' uber-cult hit "The Big Lebowski."
Daft Punk is comprised of Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter, whose quirky and energetic songs, like "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger," have garnered worldwide acclaim and all kinds of imitation. A video for that song featuring people using their hands to mimic the tune's lyrics has gotten more than 28 million views on YouTube.
And the band itself seems steeped in a sci-fi sensibility, so having Daft Punk score "Tron 2.0" is kind of a match made in heaven for the geek set.
A group of the biggest Hollywood studios said Wednesday that they will invest more than $1 billion to upgrade 20,000 North American movie theaters to digital projector systems.
According to Reuters, Disney, Paramount Pictures, Twentieth Century Fox, Universal Pictures, and Lions Gate Entertainment have reached a pact with investors, including Blackstone Group and JPMorgan Chase. The work would begin in 2009 and could take as much as 3 and 1/2 years to complete.
For some time, the studios have wanted to embark on the upgrade project, Reuters wrote, but have been unable to nail down the financing. But now, with the money in place, work can begin with the goal of making it possible for the studios to send films digitally to theaters--which would be a sea change for studios, allowing them to cut costs immensely on prints and distribution--as well as to more easily present 3D films.
"Our initial goal is to convert existing theaters of our owners, AMC and Cinemark, and Regal, which operate a little over 14,000 screens in the U.S. and Canada," Travis Reid, CEO of Digital Cinema Implementation Partners, told Reuters, adding that each screen upgrade costs around $70,000.
Already, Hollywood and theaters around North America are in the middle of a major expansion of 3D screens and a major change in the technology being used for 3D films. In the spring of 2007, there were just 720 screens equipped to run 3D films, but that number has now jumped to 1,300, Reuters reported.
For the studios and the theaters alike, adding 3D screens is a boon because of ticket premiums of $3 or more.
And that's why several studios are planning on rapidly increasing the number of films they release in 3D.
Somewhere near the town of Good Hope, Ala., my odometer for Road Trip 2008 hit 1,000 miles exactly. Road Trip 2007 clocked 4,891 miles.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)GOOD HOPE, Ala.--Somewhere along Interstate 65, on my way to Huntsville, Ala., the home of Space Camp, I hit exactly 1,000 miles of driving since Road Trip 2008 began.
I'm sure that there will be many more of these milestones, since I still have many, many more places to visit on this trip, and since last year's trip clocked 4,891 miles.
Still, I love to commemorate these round numbers, so bear with me.
It's been a busy 1,000 miles. Over the last week, Road Trip 2008 has taken me to a wide variety of places.
I spent parts of several days at Disney World, including a visit to the Animal Kingdom, and another to both Hollywood Studios and Epcot Center's greenhouse project.
I spent a day backstage at La Nouba, the Cirque du Soleil's Disney World show, and then I moved onto more serious matters: A Lockheed Martin military simulation facility. As well, I toured Adacel's Orlando, Fla., headquarters, where I was shown some of the latest technology for helping air-traffic controllers be more efficient at their jobs.
Toward the end of the week, I visited Kennedy Space Center, both for a series of tours of different elements of that gigantic facility and then to watch the landing of the Space Shuttle Discovery.
The view of the lush green surroundings alongside I-65 that was out the window of the Subaru Outback I am driving on Road Trip 2008
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)Last night, I spent the evening in the gorgeous river town of Savannah, Ga. And now, I have stopped in Huntsville so that I can spend the day at Space Camp On Monday.
And then, well, it's on to the next 1,000 miles.
Stay tuned to Road Trip 2008, by following this blog, as well as my Twitter feed and my Qik channel.
At Epcot Center in Orlando, Fla., I joined a Segway tour of the park. But before we could head out, we had to undergo about 30 minutes of training to make sure no one endangered themselves or anyone else.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)EPCOT CENTER, Fla.--Ah, lawyers.
I was sitting inside a small dome, antsy to get going on the special Segway tour of this famous theme park that I had arranged. But before they would let me or any of the others on the tour head out and ride around on our gyroscopic human transporters, we had to sit through more than half an hour of tedious, but entirely practical, training.
As our instructors told us how to get on and how to get off, how to speed up and how to slow down and so many other crucial things, I could detect the work of people in suits at a firm somewhere that probably had an ampersand in its name.
After all, when you're Disney, you want to make sure you cover all your bases when it comes to liability.
Well, fair enough. Finally, we finished up, and led by a genial woman named Carole, we headed out into Epcot for a leisurely and decidedly untaxing tour around the World Showcase, the park's collection of small scale model representations of some of the famous buildings, stores, towers and so forth from countries like France, Japan, China, Italy, Morocco, and others.
Truthfully, the tour wasn't that informative. We got maybe 30 seconds of information about each of the countries we stopped in and then we moved quickly on. I think the real point was to give us enough fodder to make us want to return later when we were on our feet.
We were instructed, by the way, not to carry anything in our hands while we rode the Segways. But what is a reporter to do? So I tried to surreptitiously carry my Nokia smartphone in my hand so I could shoot Qik video (see below) of the ride. I only got caught once.
Riding the Segways was one of the suggestions I got from readers when I asked last week what I should do at Disney World when I visited as part of Road Trip 2008, my journey around the South. And I have to say, it was a great idea. I love Segways, first of all, and secondly, how great is it to glide around effortlessly on a hot day when everyone else is working up a sweat just strolling from point A to point B.
After we returned to our starting point--no Epcot patrons were harmed in this experiment--I was met by a member of Disney World's public relations team who kindly escorted me to a van stashed conveniently nearby in staff parking, and we set off for Disney's Hollywood Studios for a whirlwind tour of the not new ride there, "Toy Story Mania."
The ride, which opened last month at Disney World and is set to open later this month at Disneyland, is a super fast-paced cacophony of an adventure based on the story line from Pixar's Toy Story films.
The idea is that you find yourself plopped down into a huge model of the little boy's room from the films and are tasked with battling a whole series of different nemeses.
So you hop into a small car, which races off into a tunnel--very Disney-esque, of course--and one by one, you have to shoot at these villains, who appear on a screen on the wall in front of you.
Being a modern ride, this attraction is full of little tricks. For example, what you see on the screen is in 3D, so you have to wear 3D glasses to see the targets properly. Also, you are firing at them with a gun mounted on your car, and you are shooting digital bullets at them which splat satisfyingly on the screen. Well, at least they seem to. They're digital, after all.
For me, the trick was both to enjoy the ride and to try to take pictures and shoot video. At first, I couldn't figure out why the pictures were coming out fuzzy, but then I realized it was the fact that the camera had no idea what to do with the 3D images.
Until I put the glasses in front of the lens, that is. Both for my camera, and then for the Nokia phone (see video below).
As you fire away, you accumulate points as you hit targets. As I understand it, the ride offers up a lot of "easter eggs," or hidden surprises. But I was too wrapped up in trying to document it to shoot much. I ended up with a rather pathetic score, especially when measured against the impressive total racked up by my escort.
We had taken a back entrance into the ride so that we didn't have to wait in the extremely long line, but after finishing we went back into the main area so that we could see some of the cool details the designers had added.
They included a large set of dominoes and a huge View-Master reel hanging from the ceiling, as well as a giant Tinker-Toy structure that all the cars have to drive through.
There were also little details that only the careful eye would catch, such as some child's books painted on the wall, the author of one of which was named Lasseter. For the Pixar fans among us, that's an obvious reference to Toy Story director and current Disney Chief Creative Officer John Lasseter.
While riding the 'Toy Story Mania' ride at Disney's Hollywood Studios, I figured out that if I put my 3D glasses in front of my camera, I could take pictures of the target screens without them coming out blurry.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)Afterward, we got back in my escort's van and zipped back over to Epcot. I still wanted a chance to go on two more of the popular rides there: "Test Track" and "Soarin'." And I figured why wait in hour-plus lines for them if I could take advantage of the secret entrances my escort could lead me to.
Sure enough, we wandered straight to the front of the "Test Track" line. This is a pretty cool ride that puts guests in the front seat of a car that is then rushed through Disney scale representations of 10 different tests that General Motors cars go through before they can hit the road.
These included going uphill fast, braking without and then with antilock brakes, accelerating (up to 65 miles an hour) on a straight-away, going over some rough road and going slowly through both a very hot and a very cold room.
Fun stuff, actually, and another attraction you, my beloved readers, had suggested I try.
Unfortunately, though, we couldn't work out a way to expedite entry to "Soarin'," so I decided to try my luck at getting one of Disney World's FastPasses--which allow you to get a ticket guaranteeing quick entry much later in the day--for the ride.
Sure enough, I was one of the very last people to get one of the tickets, but my time wasn't for about six hours. So I went back to my hotel, did some work, and then finally returned, right on time.
"Soarin'" is actually pretty sweet: it puts you in the seat of what is meant to be something along the lines of a hang-glider and then whisks you, with your seat seeming to rush into the wind, diving or climbing with what you see on screen, up, down and over things like the Golden Gate Bridge, a ski slope, a Napa vineyard, the ocean, a river, a desert, and more.
It was pretty exhilarating. In parts, at least. The realistic effects of the seats rocking back and forth definitely helped, as did the huge screen and the larger-than life video on it.
Finished with "Soarin'," my day was pretty much over. A long day, to be sure, but one with plenty of thrills.
Even if some lawyers got in the way of all my fun on my Segway.
A look from above at the Cirque du Soleil's La Nouba theater at the Downtown Disney resort in Orlando, Fla. La Nouba was the Cirque's third permanent show and the first with its own freestanding building.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)ORLANDO, Fla.--If you've seen the Cirque du Soleil Las Vegas shows Ka, Love or O, you've probably been led to expect that every one of the company's performances is full of wonderful technical achievements.
The truth is that it doesn't take that much technology to make a great Cirque show, as the folks who put together La Nouba, the Cirque's show here, explained to me Tuesday.
When it launched in late 1998, La Nouba was just the third permanent Cirque show, after Mystere and O. But it was the first to get its own freestanding building. Today, 10 years later, the tall white structure stands out as a signal of world-class circus theater to anyone who passes by the Downtown Disney resort here.
On the second day of my Road Trip 2008 through the South, I spent most of the morning on a behind-the-scenes tour of the La Nouba theater. For a Cirque junkie like me, this was a treat, even though it was the fifth Cirque show I've gotten such a tour of.
"La Nouba is all about the artists," said technical director Ken Ramsey, by way of explaining that I wouldn't be seeing too much of the uber-tech behind some of the Vegas shows. "The technical side takes a very silent rest, as opposed to being the spectacle like in Ka and O.
But that doesn't mean La Nouba is a dud. It's one of the most energetic Cirque shows around, and there is, in fact, plenty of tech to go around.
We started our tour on the La Nouba stage, where I felt the presence of dozens of Olympic-caliber gymnasts all around me. The show's operations production manager, Robert Shuck, explained that the stage has five lifts built into it, each one of which can rise out of the floor up to 16 feet.
To prove the point, Shuck got on a walkie-talkie and asked someone to demonstrate. Seconds later, one of the lifts began to push up out of the floor, and before I knew it, it was towering over Shuck.
Not to focus too much on what the lifts look like when they're above the stage, we next went down into the theater's lower levels where the lifts live when they're not on display.
In the costume room, staff members work from early in the morning until late at night making, mending, and inspecting the performers' costumes. Here, red outfits hang on a rack.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)And these are no light platforms. According to Shuck, the one lift I got into requires a 14,000 pound counterweight to get its 30,000 pounds and up to 3,000 pounds of "live load," otherwise known as performers, to rise.
We started talking about the visit I took last summer to Ka and how I was told at the time that one of the biggest challenges facing the Vegas shows is the steady increase in the amount of interference that makes it hard for that show's crew to communicate by wireless headsets.
I had figured that was a Vegas problem, but Ramsey and Shuck explained that the same problem is creeping up in Orlando. That's because HDTV stations are coming online nearby and crowding out the available frequency for the kinds of wireless communications the Cirque needs.
"Everything went to hell," Shuck said. "We (now have to) run wired headsets until the manufacturers" figure out a solution.
At this point, we headed back up into the theater where the show's trapeze artists were about to begin their twice-weekly training exercises.
The best part about that, other than getting to watch these incredibly gifted athletes perform without hundreds and hundreds of other people in the room, was getting to see them setting up the safety net the artists perform above. (See related video below)
It takes the crew about 15 minutes to set up the net during the training sessions. But according to head rigger Dave Phillips, the same task takes just a couple of minutes during the actual show (he attributed that to the fact that it's not the main crew that does the setup during training). Also, it was pretty clear that there was a much more relaxed mood going on at that point than during the show.
Next up, we rode an elevator up to the theater's top floor, the 9th, otherwise known as the "grid."
Here is where most of the rigging is controlled, and this was Phillips' domain. All around us were various pulley and counterweight systems, and not a lot of automation. But that's not a problem for pulling off a great show, Phillips insisted.
"Sometimes low tech is the best stuff," he said, pointing out a chandelier hanging down from below the grid as an example. He said that a rigger takes the chandelier off its hook and drops it down into the theater. It is backed up by a bungie so it has a slow, smooth motion when it goes down.
"We just couldn't get the right look for it" by using technology, Phillips said. "Sometimes the best solutions are the easiest and cheapest."
Another fairly low-tech solution Phillips explained was the method he and his crew used to design one of the show's sets, a group of flapping doors that behave a bit like birds.
He said that Cirque management demanded the look, but it was no easy task coming up with a way to do it. Finally, though, he and his team settled on a motor system that wags the doors with what he called "rotisserie action" on the end.
In the 10 years since La Nouba opened, a lot has changed for Cirque du Soleil. It is now a much bigger organization; it has basically taken over Las Vegas--with five shows there already and at least two more in the works, as well as new resident shows planned for openings in Tokyo and Macao later this summer.
But to people who have worked in the company for years, like Ramsey, the low-key, small-crew nature of La Nouba is preferable to the highly structured huge and expensive shows the Cirque is creating these days.
While many of the La Nouba sets are lowered or raised from above the stage, some come from above the theater itself.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)La Nouba has just 32 crew members, while shows like Ka require more than 150.
"This allows everyone to work a lot closer together," Ramsey said.
And Phillips added, "It gives everyone an appreciation for what every department does."
Down below, on the theater's seventh floor, is where we finally encountered the show's high technology.
Of course, this is not the latest gear available to the theater industry, but pretty much the stuff La Nouba has been using since it opened. But according to Rob Pooley, head of operations for the show, that's no big deal.
From left to right, La Nouba technical director Ken Ramsey, operations production manager Robert Shuck, and head rigger Dave Phillips.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)He showed me Dynatrac, the software used to control the gear that runs the show's many cues, and said it's the same program he's been using since the beginning. And, while it once took one of his engineers three eight-hour shifts to figure out how to do something that newer software used by the Ka crew could do in 30 minutes, he said there's no need to change the system since La Nouba itself has barely changed in its ten years.
Our last stop was on the main floor of the theater, and it was a place I had not gotten to see in all my previous behind-the-scenes-at-the-Cirque visits: the costume room.
Here, Mary Amlund, the head of wardrobe, and her team of 12, put constant attention into making sure that the 67 performers in La Nouba always have perfect costumes.
Amlund explained that there are people in the costume room from 6:30 a.m. until about 12:30 in the morning on show days doing laundry, inspecting costumes for holes and rips, mending, and making new outfits. She said the average costume lasts about six weeks, while some last up to six months.
For a Cirque fan like me, this room was a special treat. Everywhere I looked were outfits exploding in reds and blues, gorgeous hats and much more.
Operations production manager Robert Shuck explains the show's power track trampoline act. He said that unlike a previous form of trampoline flooring used in another Cirque show, power track provides more bounce for performers.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)And while we talked, some of the costume crew were hard at work, inspecting every inch of some of the outfits for tears, moving slowly and methodically as they did so.
Finally, the tour was over, and we emerged into an office space full of cubicles. It was hard to believe that this was still Cirque du Soleil.
But then again, even the circus needs office workers.
A gorilla does his best to ignore everyone around as a Monday afternoon crowd at Animal Kingdom in Orlando, Fla., looks on.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)ANIMAL KINGDOM, Fla.--And so it begins.
For the third year in a row, I've set out for a lengthy journey through one of the United States' major geographic regions. It's time for Road Trip 2008, several thousand miles of traveling the American South.
Last year it was the Southwest, and in 2006 it was the Pacific Northwest.
And since I've started this trip in Orlando, there's only one way to really begin: total immersion in Disney World.
That's why at about 9 p.m. Sunday--after checking into my hotel and getting situated, I jumped on a shuttle and headed on over to Magic Kingdom, where I was able to stay--standing up most of the time, mind you--until nearly 2 a.m. Monday.
But more on that later.
A meerkat looks for danger at Animal Kingdom. Most likely, it is safe from the hordes of 9-year-olds who come to stare at it intently each day.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)Today, after taking care of a few Road Trip practicalities, such as buying a USB hub and getting all my camera gear taken care of, I hopped another shuttle and made it here, to this family-packed, animal-theme wonderland.
Fortunately, since I'm staying at one of Disney World's resort hotels, I'm able to stay late at some of the parks. That's why I was able to play around in Magic Kingdom so late last night and why I'll be able to patrol Animal Kingdom until 11 tonight.
Which is good, because I haven't gotten to see that much.
Mainly, I wanted to orient myself and take this first opportunity to share some of what I've been doing.
One of the first things I did was wander into the domain of a rather paranoid meerkat. But, despite its cuddly visage, it's actually quite the nervous animal, so it being hyper-aware of everything around it wasn't surprising.
Nearby was the gorilla enclosure, and sure enough, an adult male and adult female ape were happy to indulge the oh-so-eager masses wanting to see them. Whether they were willing to express their happiness at our presence is another matter. Their faces were more the picture of pensive solo thought.
I myself have spent much of my time here, and at Magic Kingdom last night, wondering about these places and what they mean in our society. And while this might not be the place for my philosophical ramblings on the matter, I will say one thing: if you have some choice of when to come to Disney World, I'd suggest maybe staying away when the world's kids aren't in school--it is a madhouse here.
But, there's still fun to be had if you're willing to wait, or to try the ride less traveled.
For instance, last night--I guess more accurately, early this morning--after walking around for hours and being rather exhausted and unable to deal with the still imposing after-midnight crowds--I alighted on Alladin's magic carpet ride in Magic Kingdom.
There were no lines, and it was possible to get on and stay on as long as you liked. So, needing a little peaceful solitude, that's just what I did, staying put for six full go-rounds, rising up as high as I could each time and enjoying the lovely breeze and sense of being alone that came from riding above everyone else.
Back here at Animal Kingdom, I was struck by the One Tree. This is a masterpiece of man-made detail, a phenomenal faux-tree with endless animal life carved into its synthetic trunk and roots.
The One Tree, the centerpiece of Animal Kingdom. Though from afar it looks real, its actually man-made on top of an old oil platform.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)From what I gather, the "tree" was actually built on top of the structure of an old oil platform, and looking at it from below, it's easy to see why they needed to use something that big: this is one mammoth plant.
Speaking of things man-made, that leads me to technology, one of the things that will feature prominently throughout Road Trip. I'm testing out a number of devices, and I had one of them on-hand with me today: a smartphone loaded with Qik's live streaming media service. This is a device that allows you to live-broadcast low-fi video to the Internet. I encourage you to stay tuned to my Qik channel throughout Road Trip, as I'll be incorporating this a lot.
For the time being, though, I am still in learning mode with this thing. So if you do peruse my channel, I beg a little bit of indulgence as I master this thing. Rocky video, poor timing, and even the wrong orientation are things that may frustrate you today but which I promise you will get better as I go.
Lastly, I had with me a Pal Mickey, a little toy Mickey Mouse that senses where it is in any one of four Disney World parks and blurts out little pieces of trivia or jokes about the parks' many features.
This is definitely for kids, as the information really doesn't lead to much actual understanding of what's going on, but it does serve to alert you to what you're walking around, as, for example, I neared the gorilla enclosure, Mickey vibrated and laughed and prompted me to squeeze his belly to tell me a bad joke about the gorillas.
And, well, I'm an adult, but if I was a kid, I'd probably really have enjoyed that.
But since Mickey is a little bit age-inappropriate for me, and since I've already gotten the idea of what this interactive toy does, I'm going to give my Pal Mickey away sometime in the next couple of days.
If you're in Disney World right now, and are reading this, and you're the first person to Twitter me (my ID is GreeterDan) the name of the animal that shares space with the meerkats, Pal Mickey is yours. But only until the end of business Wednesday. After that, I won't be here to make the hand-off.
And since you'll be heading on over to Twitter anyway, please consider following me there, as I'll be posting updates there about Road Trip constantly.
And that's because there's still a long way to go now that I'm on the road. Please stay tuned. I promise a fun ride.
A new partnership between Disney and Google has resulted in a 3D overlay in Google Earth of most of the rides, buildings, and other features of Disney World. This is how Big Thunder Mountain Railroad looks in Google Earth.
(Credit: Google Earth)SAN FRANCISCO--It's hard for me to believe, but in only three days, I'll be hopping on a plane and heading east for the beginning of Road Trip 2008, my journey through the American South to write about and photograph many of the region's most interesting destinations.
One of the very first stops will be Disney World, in Orlando, Fla., and over the last few days, I've noticed that there are at least a couple of new applications that can help people like me get ready for the total immersion experience that is a visit to Florida's home of the Mouse.
The first is one that was unveiled Thursday. It's the result of a partnership between Disney and Google, and it's a 3D overlay of Disney World for Google Earth.
The idea, as written about by my colleague Josh Lowensohn, is to give Disney World fans, as well as those who are getting ready to visit the Manhattan-sized collection of theme parks, a way to peer deep down into them without having to put on sunscreen or pay the daily ticket price.
And it's quite useful, too, for seeing just how big Disney World really is, where things are in relation to each other, and to get a feel for the (digital) space.
The Tree of Life in the Animal Kingdom at Disney World, as seen in Google Earth.
(Credit: Google Earth)It's certainly not anything like a real visit, but it's a good way to get a sense of what you're in for, or to realize that maybe two days isn't quite enough and that you'd better plan and budget for a whole week. Or something along those lines.
Another interesting tool for discovering what's going on at Disney World is Twisney, a user-generated site that allows park-goers to e-mail or Twitter from their mobile devices what they're doing at that moment.
This is useful, it seems to me, because the more people who use it, the better you can see what the real-life conditions at the park are, in real time.
So, for example, if a popular ride is suddenly closed, there's a chance someone will post that to Twisney.com. And if you're paying attention, you can know to avoid going in that direction.
On Twisney, visitors to Disney World can see what other park-goers are saying about what's going on in real time.
(Credit: Twisney.com)Similarly, it can be useful if a Twisney poster has alerted readers to the fact that there are shorter than usual lines at a ride, or if something particularly interesting is going on somewhere.
For me, this is all a big learning process, as I've never been to Disney World, and I must admit I'm a bit intimidated by my visit there next week because I'm not just going to play. I'm going to report on some of the more interesting, tech-centric angles at the park, and so there's a whole lot of potential ground to cover and not that much time to do it in.
But with the above-mentioned tools, plus a slew of good tips I got from readers after pleading for help on this blog a few days ago, I think I'm better prepared than I'd expected to be at this point.
So starting Tuesday, stay tuned to this space to see what I'm doing on Road Trip 2008, and please also follow my tweets on Twitter and my videos on my Qik channel.
NASA and Disney are teaming up to put a figurine of 'Toy Story' space ranger Buzz Lightyear on the Space Shuttle Discovery when it launches on Saturday. The toy will be taken to the International Space Station, the destination for the shuttle.
(Credit: Disney)
Talk about cross-promotion.
One of the closest things to Disney World's Orlando, Fla., home, is NASA's Kennedy Space Center. This is relevant because on Friday, it was announced that among the objects expected to be blasted into the sky with the planned Saturday launch of the Space Shuttle Discovery is a figurine of Toy Story space ranger Buzz Lightyear.
Disney World, of course, is where the new Toy Story Mania ride has just opened.
The idea behind putting Buzz Lightyear aboard the Space Shuttle has to do with the "Toys in Space" initiative NASA and Disney are starting. This is an educational program designed to inspire children's interest in space and celestial discovery.
This is all also relevant to me because on June 10, I'll be hitting the highways for Road Trip 2008. I'll start in Orlando, and before I visit many of the South's most interesting destinations, I'll be stopping by both Disney World and the Kennedy Space Center.
At the theme park, I expect to visit and do a story on the Toy Story ride, and at the NASA facility I hope to be able to see the Space Shuttle land.
If the latter happens, however, I won't be seeing Buzz Lightyear, as the toy will have stayed behind on the space station.
Stay tuned to the Road Trip, and be sure to keep up, both now and during the trip, with what I'm doing on Twitter.
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