When Walt Disney opened his first theme park in 1955, he wanted it to be joyful. However, he created much more than that. What he created was fun, but also engaging, engrossing, inspiring, and immersive. In the most visceral way possible, it’s memorable. Disney himself would have called it “magic.” It includes the work of ambitious engineers, inventive artists, and cutting-edge technologies. 

At Disneyland and the other eleven Disney parks, new ideas might emerge but what’s also important is how they are executed. “We’re in the business of making transformational experiences,” says Bei Yang, vice president and technology studio executive at Walt Disney Imagineering (WDI), which conceives, designs, and builds the attractions at Disney theme parks. Among Disney’s bag of tricks are disciplines such as architecture, design, industrial manufacturing, digital media, animation, animatronics, and 3D modeling—all used for maximal effect.

According to Yang, “We have to take all of these industries and put them together to deliver the experiences that we want to deliver.” Although WDI didn’t invent the notion of industry convergence, it has aimed to perfect it. Understanding its approach can help enterprises of all sizes and in all sectors achieve Disney-size innovations.

Telling Stories 

Although Disney is best known for its films and parks, its core product is stories. “Ever since mankind looked up at the stars, trying to make sense of the world, we’ve been using stories to offer lessons, offer advice, and pass down knowledge from generation to generation,” Yang said. “This is the fundamental way that humans communicate and connect with one another, and it’s the tool we use to create transformational experiences.”

Disney’s stories are built around the classic hero’s journey structure where an ordinary person receives an extraordinary call to action. With the help of a mentor, who trains and prepares them, the hero confronts an incredible challenge in a fantastical place, from whence they ultimately return triumphant and transformed. “Disney parks offer this to our guests,” says Yang. 

Changing technologies also changes rides even as they maintain their story. For example, “Pirates of the Caribbean: Battle for the Sunken Treasure,” at Shanghai Disneyland is different than the original. The “Pirates of the Caribbean” ride at Disneyland was based entirely on animatronic vignettes, the Shanghai version features magnet-powered boats, next-generation animatronics that are interactive instead of passive, and immersive digital media—all of which is precisely synchronized and choreographed.

Handling Increased Complexity

The fruits of converging technologies are more obvious at scale, as evidenced by Walt Disney World in Orlando, FL. At 43 square miles (twice the size of Manhattan), Walt Disney World is home to four theme parks, each operated like a small city. Not only do these parks feature rides and attractions, but they also incorporate power plants, water plants, and transportation systems. According to WDI Executive Creative Director, Asa Kalama, “Creating these city-scale experiences is a massive design challenge.” And none was more a challenge than Disneyland’s and Disney World’s Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge. 

Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge is a fully immersive theme park based on the Star Wars film franchise and offers “a level of detail that rivals any set ever created for the movies,” Kalama explains. “It’s the largest single-theme land expansion in the history of Disney Parks. Creatively, technically, and logistically, it’s one of the most ambitious projects in our history.”

The park’s signature attraction is a life-size replica of the Millennium Falcon that Star Wars fans can pilot themselves during a virtual ride through the galaxy.

“It’s big because the whole experience is big, as was the team behind designing it,” Kalama says of the 110-foot Millennium Falcon. “The team included workers with over 140 different disciplines from all around the globe—concept artists, designers, facility architects, landscape architects, interior designers, show set designers, graphic designers, media designers, ride engineers, software developers, as well as a host of amazing trade partners.”

Coordinating so many disciplines across time zones was “a Herculean task,” according to Kalama, who says the secret to successful convergence at that scale is building information modeling (BIM). “The final experience that our guests enjoy today is the product of over 600 different models, all integrated to a single source encompassing design, fabrication, and installation,” he says.

BIM enabled the teams to operate more quickly. “We were able to collapse our sequencing and have multiple disciplines all working in parallel, often at different levels of detail, on things that would otherwise need to happen sequentially. And in the end, this allowed us to deliver one of the most technically challenging attractions we’ve ever created months ahead of our target turnover date,” Kalama said.

The promise of industry convergence is in using BIM and other digital technologies to choreograph diverse experts to deliver projects of unfathomable size, scale, and complexity with speed and quality. According to Yang, theme parks are just the beginning. He suggests that all manner of emerging technologies—from augmented reality to autonomous vehicles to smart cities will demand Disney-size integration efforts. No matter what industry you’re in, “there’s going to be more, tighter integration,” Yang concludes. 

For information: 

Autodesk 

Disney 

Building Information Modeling

Lead image is the Millennium Falcon at Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge in Walt Disney World, courtesy of The Walt Disney Company.

This article was adapted from a customer story originally published by Autodesk.

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