00100	CART MEMO #6						SEPT 1971
00200	                           DISNEY'S ROBOTS
00300	                              Baumgart

00400	
00500		The Computer Section of Audio Animatronix of the  Walter  Eli
00600	Disney  Enterprises,  (WED  Enterprises)  can  be  reached by calling
00700	213-245-8951 x368. In the computing section Dick Bayer is  in  charge
00800	of  hardware  and Dave Sneider is in charge of Software, however Dave
00900	was in Florida at Disney World so I talked to Andy Woo in Software.
01000	
01100		Audio  Animatronixs  has built about 500 robots or "figures".
01200	Two hundred figures are at Disneyland and the others  are  at  Disney
01300	World. Figures range in size from birds six inches high to bears that
01400	are ten feet high. The most complicated figure is the Abraham Lincoln
01500	robot at Disneyland. Abe has 80 programmible actions.
01600	
01700		Figures are driven by a tape or  Data  Disc,  thru  a  device
01800	called  a  Show Control Unit, SCU. The SCU reads the tape or disk and
01900	drives DA converters for all the actions of  all  the  figures  of  a
02000	given show. A show may last from 4 to 30 minutes.
02100	
02200		Figures  have  been  animated  using pneumatic, hydraulic and
02300	electrical systems. Both feedback servoed  and  opened  loop  motions
02400	exist.  The  feedback  is not under programmible control.  All Orders
02500	are sent to the figures by cable and there  is  no  figure  that  can
02600	walk.  Furthermore  Sneider  says  that  with  the possible except of
02700	Lincoln, which has extremely fine hands, no figure can pick  a  block
02800	up  off  a  table (a Lincoln is busy giving his speech and hasn't had
02900	time to be reprogrammed for such an experiment).
03000	
03100	
03200		The  SCU's  are  built by Mapo Inc of WED. The name "Mapo" is
03300	short for "Mary Popkins" which was being filmed at the time Mapo  was
03400	founded.
03500	The SCU and tapes are all spawned by  a  single  computer  in
03600	Glendale  (at  Mapo)  which  is a 32K 16-bit Honeywell DP-516, better
03700	know to us as an IMP.
03800	
03900		At Disney Appearance and entertainmnt are the main goals. The
04000	robots are initially designed by Animation Artists and Script Writers
04100	who give the programmers and builders cartoon  drawings  and  a  show
04200	script to be built and executed.