Results for articles with tag 'disney' (3 total)
08/15/2007 10:02:27 PM 
It's an interesting example that shows just how far the company goes to get the feeling right.
Here's part of an interview with the lead designer on the project.
"Well yeah, there’s gobs of stuff. The village that we’ve created at the foot of the mountain is really one of the best environments I think we’ve ever built, certainly at Animal Kingdom, I won’t speak of the rest of Imagineering because there’s fantastic environments everywhere. But it’s quite an amazing environment. You know, we don’t really do replications, right? We create our places, we create our stories. But we want to create a place, that when you’re walking around in it, you still have the sense that “man, this feels like REAL!” We collaborated with Nepalese architects and woodcarvers and designers in creating a lot of the wood carved detail in all the windows and doors and walls, including a very authentic Nepalese pagoda structure, it’s called a Mandir, dedicated to the mythology of the Yeti. It’s probably the only structure of its kind in North America. And this was designed and produced for us by these Nepalese woodcarvers. We brought it here and erected it as part of the queue, and it’s just this fantastic carved wood pagoda structure, covered in carvings and images of the Yeti that we developed in tandem, in partnership with these Nepalese artists, and that was pretty cool! We never could have done that if we hadn’t gone there, met them face to face, had these discussions with them and been able to share and develop a visual way of representing this Yeti."
Joe Rohde - Executive Designer- Walt Disney Imaginering
Everest Expedition features 10 species of trees, 110 species of shrubs that re-create the lowlands surrounding Mount Everest and 2,000 handcrafted items from Asia are evident in the props, cabinetry and architectural ornamentation.
Here's the ride in all it's user-generated YouTube glory.
Posted by Ed Cotton
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06/06/2007 05:52:44 PM
The post references Anne's recent trips into the field and onto college campuses, where she witnessed first hand the changing media habits of this new college generation.
"Even on days when she's being a mom instead of a high-powered executive. Sweeney, who's based in Los Angeles, was on the East Coast primarily to visit college campuses with her daughter. Seven colleges in a week. Sweeney couldn't help but notice how ubiquitous laptops were and which shows resonated with students (the lounge TV on one campus had a sign that read, "Reserved for Lost"). "The trip has definitely given me a view of this younger group's experience with media that I don't normally get," she says. "It's first-hand market research. I've got a thousand ideas from this."
Not to mention a new appreciation for that generation's WiFi expectations. "Last night, we checked into the hotel, my daughter said, 'Oh, I’m so happy.' I said, Because you’re in New York? She said, 'No, because I finally have a signal.'"
Sweeney had to grin. "Yeah, that’s what I said to my mother on my college tour."It leaves us thinking:
1. Should we assume that all this was new news to her?
2. Based on this illuminating experience, shouldn't she be getting out of the office more often?
3. Shouldn't her research folks be doing a better job of bringing their targets to life?
This is a tale about experiences counting for far more than listening to a research debrief.
It's a big challenge for all planners, agencies and consultants.
How do you get the client to understand it, if they don't experience it?
You have to try and make the client a part of the process and you have to bring creativity to your findings; bring them to life for those who didn't experience it first hand.
Make the research, creative.
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05/17/2007 06:50:19 AM
The blog is the brainchild of Matt a 23-year-old student who’s currently finishing up a journalism/advertising degree.
Influx fired some questions off to him and here are his responses are below.
1. Who are some of history's most interesting visionaries?
My favorite visionaries tend to be those that think big without claiming to know the future. I’ve had an odd fascination with Walt Disney my entire life.
People like Disney are interesting to me because they had an optimistic sincerity that the world could change for the better. As I’ve written about on the blog, we live in an era of postmodern paleo-futurism. We don’t own our visions of the future. We co-opt past visions of the future (see Futurama, Meet the Robinsons, etc) with an ironic
detachment. I often wonder if an era of sincerity will ever return.
2. Who did you think in the mid C20th came closest to seeing what the C21st century would be like?
I think post-WWII America had a blank canvas of consumerism to work with. For that reason, the corporations were usually the most accurate in projecting the technological advancements 10 and 20 years out. Predicting the world of 50 years hence is quite a task, and no one in the mid-20th century did that with much accuracy. One of the lesser known futurists of that era I recommend checking out is Victor Cohn. He was a science and medical journalist that had the fantastic visions of
the future you’d expect from the 1950s futurists but he approached futurism with a journalistic ethic which provided the input of MIT engineers and the like.
3. What' are some of the things that no one saw coming?
There are few things that no one saw coming. The things no one saw coming were accidents like Scotchgard and Post-It notes. We still haven’t caught up to the fanciful future envisioned in 1900! Personal flying machines, weather control, meals-in-a-pill; none of these things have yet become commonplace, often for very good reason. I think one of the few things people didn't see coming was how little the world would
change.
The world is quite obviously a better place thanks to advancements in public health but we still haven't cured cancer. People were expecting flying cars but didn't necessarily see the ability to hold 20,000 songs on a portable music player.
4. What do you think of the role of the futurist today? What's changed?
The role of the futurist is still to excite our imaginations. That hasn’t changed. What has changed is the tone. If the 2007 equivalent of Walt Disney pitched an idea like EPCOT today he would be laughed off the face of the planet.
That is not to say I advocate the idea of an authoritarian community like EPCOT, but 2007 seems to be missing the positive thinking futurist that can be taken seriously. We dwell on the negative rather than emphasizing the possibilities of the future.
5. Who would you recommend Influx's readers check out who has an
interesting take on the next 50 years?
Ray Kurzweil is the most interesting futurist of our time but quite frankly he predicts a rather bleak future for humankind. His ideas about the coming “Technological Singularity” and using technology to achieve immortality are interesting but if researching for the Paleo-Future blog has taught me anything, it’s that no one is
omniscient.
6. What's your current reading list- blogs, books, etc...
The Anarchist in the Library by Siva Vaidhyanathan (after you’ve read
Lawrence Lessig’s Free Culture, pick this one up.)
Where’s My Jetpack? By Daniel H. Wilson (the very definition of
paleo-future)
The Areas of My Expertise by John Hodgman (I flip through this quite
often. John Hodgman is brilliant. Read the section about the Mall of
America if you get a chance. It is hilarious.)
Dilbert Blog
Boing Boing
AdvertisingLab
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Articles for tag disney (3 total).