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Pirates of the Caribbean | New Disneyland Animatronic Technology

Matthew Krul

This summer, Disneyland Park unveiled a new animatronic at Pirates of the Caribbean. This figure uses patented technology—made possible with Epic Games Unreal Engine—that projection maps onto an audio-animatronic using real-time feedback. While this addition has been met with some initial controversy online among Disney fans, I had the opportunity to see this in person this summer. In this episode, I break down the new technology created by Walt Disney Imagineering, review the experience, and discuss potential implications.

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Imagination Skyway is a Disney Parks and Imagineering podcast. Episodes explore attraction design, recap Disney news, and dive into the stories behind the magic, including interviews with Disney Imagineers, Disney Legends, and other Disney creators. Not affiliated with or endorsed by The Walt Disney Company. Disney is a trademark of The Walt Disney Company.

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Transcript (Auto-Generated):

How did Walt Disney Imagineering use new technology to update the classic Pirates of the Caribbean attraction at Disneyland? In this episode, I’ll analyze the technology, in my opinion, of this new experience. Welcome aboard Imagination Skyway, your guided tour through the worlds of Disney and Imagineering. I’m your host, Matthew Krul, and it’s my job to explore the stories and places we love and the people who bring them to life. Before we get started, remember that you can unlock ad free episodes and bonus content at patreon dot com slash skyway and get complimentary trip support from our sponsors at KMV Travel dot com slash skyway. Plus, be sure to follow Imagination Skyway on social media for even more content and ways to connect with the show. Today’s episode is going to be a quick one where I discuss the updated pirate at Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland. If you didn’t see the news back in June of twenty twenty six, Disney updated this classic what was formerly a static skeleton figure in Pirates of the Caribbean to an Audio-animatronic with new projection mapping technology. In this episode, I’m going to discuss the technology that was used, how people are responding to it, and my full analysis of this new figure at this classic attraction at Disneyland Park. As we begin our journey, please remain seated. Keep your hands and arms inside the podcast at all times and enjoy your journey aboard Imagination Skyway. This spring, Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland, the original Pirates of the Caribbean attraction underwent a refurbishment and reopened in June to a somewhat controversial reception on social media. I had the opportunity to visit Disneyland in July with my family, and one of the highlights of my trip was going to see this update in person with my own two eyes. And I said, when I posted on social media, I was going to produce a podcast episode discussing my initial thoughts about this single updates that I’m going to be talking about in just a minute here. And then I had pivoted to recapping the Disneyland trip, uh, producing some podcast episodes from that, then predictions for D23, then recap of D23, then content for my summer trip with my family back in August. And finally, here we are a couple of months later talking about this update to Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland. Now, if you’re not familiar with this update, Walt Disney Imagineering inserted a new animatronic figure into a space that was formerly without animatronics. And that’s not the controversy in itself. And I’ll say that the controversy is really, for the most part, limited to social media and in particular those who have not seen it in person. There are plenty of people who have seen it in person who don’t view this update favourably. And then there are plenty who have seen it in person who do view it favourably. As usual, I’m somewhere in the middle. I like to take a very balanced approach, look at things holistically and come with a very logical approach to discussing and adding context for the Imagineering behind this. The decisions that went into this update and how it really impacts your experience when you step away from the social media comments, which, by the way, I strongly recommend I don’t read comments anymore. It’s wonderful. And you get a much more balanced perspective on everything when you ignore the comments and the opinions on social media. So here’s my balanced approach to this. I first want to set the stage. If you’re not familiar with Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland, it is the original Pirates of the Caribbean attraction. It is one of the last attractions that Walt Disney personally oversaw before he unfortunately passed away in nineteen sixty six. It is in New Orleans Square and the attraction is a little different than if you are. I know most of my listeners are on the East Coast or primarily visit Walt Disney World, and so you might not be familiar with the Disneyland version, which I will say is superior to the Walt Disney World version in every way except for, as I say, time and again, the queue because I love having that that fort as you walk through that was inspired by Castillo del Morro in Puerto Rico. And you are, you know, it’s very immersive and atmospheric queue. It’s great in the summer. It’s cool in there. It’s got that pirate overture playing as you’re walking through. But the Disneyland version, the ride itself, I really think is superior in just about every way. And to set the stage for where this animatronic is featured in the beginning of the attraction, you board the boats in this Louisiana like bayou, um, dock, and then you go through the bayou. It’s, you know, very remote. It’s it’s at night. You’ve got fireflies, you’ve got banjos playing in the background. Very ominously, you pass by the Blue Bayou restaurant in a way very reminiscent of the later open San Angel Inn and Epcot, the Grand Fiesta tour that passes by that same sort of scene. And then you go down not one, but two waterfalls. Now, what happens next? The closest equivalents is if you’ve been to Walt Disney World, you go through the, you know, the beginning of that attraction. You go through the present day and see what happened to the pirates who discovered the cursed treasure before at the Walt Disney World version. You then go down the drop into the past to see what. What was happening when the pirates were ransacking the town and and eventually discover this cursed treasure. So at the Disneyland version, you go down a series of drops from the bayou, and then you enter the present day. You know, you find these these skeletons all over these ominous dark caves. There’s a thunderstorm happening in the background, as you see that it’s very similar to the same exact scene before you go down the drop at Walt Disney World with that pirate who is captaining the ship through the storm. Um, same thing, you know, you pass by that at the sort of basement level of the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction at Disneyland. And then you go through these various scenes that were developed by Marc Davis. And Claude Coates has this very ominous, if you think about their partnership on, for example, Haunted Mansion, Claude Coates was the person who really set the mood, the setting, the atmosphere with that ominous haunted mansion. And Marc Davis inserted a lot of humor with the characters and the the gags that happen throughout the attraction. Very similar partnership here with Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland, where you have this ominous environment, this very atmospheric environment that was created by Claude Coates of these, you know, these caverns that are just larger than life. And again, that that thunderstorm that’s happening in the background and then going through eventually a very dark tunnel that takes you to the past and you have these gags that were set by Mark Davis of, for instance, a skeleton who’s forever drinking this. Uh, can imagine it’s probably a bottle of rum that’s just going literally right through him. And you have the famous one that we’re going to talk about here, a not so much a gag, but more of a, um, a picture that you want to set in your mind of a, uh, looks like a captain skeleton pirate who’s sitting atop this tremendous pile of gold and jewels with this gold, uh, treasure chest in front of him. And the treasure chest is open. But you see that the pirate skeleton is sitting on top of the pile now, a dead skeleton. And, you know, up until that point, I think that you, as a guest floating through the attraction from the sixties through twenty twenty six, either had to know the backstory or start to piece it together. And I think it is pretty easy to piece together what eventually happens to these pirates. But that’s about it, right? Is is sort of this story left to the imagination of, of what might have happened with all these contextual clues as you’re floating through the attraction. Now, the updates to get to it after six minutes here of what eventually ended up happening is when parts of the Caribbean reopened in June of twenty twenty six. That Captain Skeleton that was sitting atop of this pile of gold became an animated audio-animatronic figure. Now, it was not just a simple, practical, audio-animatronic figure like throughout the rest of Pirates of the Caribbean. And I think that would be one thing that perhaps Disney fans could, um, could debate whether it’s worth having this space that was formerly very static, Have it feature an animated figure. But I think the other piece that adds to the controversy is that it is an Annie, an audio-animatronic figure with new projection mapping technology that gives it. I’ll be honest with you. Look at it up close, a very cartoonish looking face, which perhaps doesn’t fit, um, the surrounding space of this, uh, very, you know, with these practical stage sets that were developed in the sixties. Um, it perhaps that’s one of the arguments made here by those who do not like this update. Um, it just doesn’t fit. So let me tell you a little bit about the technology here and how it fits into how this update fits into the story. So to explain, you can always go on social media or on YouTube and find countless videos of this pirate. Um, but what ends up happening is you see this, this skeleton pirate, and he comes to life and picks up this gold, um, this gold coin. As soon as he picks up the gold coin, you see his face suddenly transform. He turns into a skeleton, and when he turns into a skeleton, his arm falls under the weight of himself, and he drops the coin back into the chest. Now, when he drops the coin back into the chest, the curse is no longer upon him. So he turns back to life, and when he turns back to life, he looks down into the gold treasure chest. He sees the gold being a greedy pirate. He picks up back, picks that coin back up and turns back into a skeleton again. The coin falls back into the gold chest, and when it does, he comes back to life. He sees the gold coin again. I think you get the idea. It’s this endless cycle. Um, where he comes to life, grabs the gold coin, turns into a skeleton, drops the coin, comes back to life, grabs the coin, turns back into a skeleton. So as this is happening, which the sequence takes about fifteen seconds or so. You are learning as you float through because that’s seen as roughly twenty to 30s. So you see it happen a couple of times. You suddenly start to understand what’s happening here, that there is a cursed treasure, that the pirates who touch the gold treasure turn into skeletons and are forever cursed to remain skeletons. Except for this one pirate who happens to drop his gold and is in an endless cycle of greed to pick up that gold, turn into a skeleton, drop the gold, turn into a skeleton. On and on for eternity. So from a story perspective, that’s how it fits here. From a technology perspective, it’s very interesting what they’re doing here. So many people are equating this to what was done at frozen ever After originally. Um, or Seven Dwarfs mine train where you have these animated projection mapped faces, but this is a different technology that was developed by Walt Disney Imagineering with a few things that are happening here. So first of all, this was possible thanks to their partnership with Epic Games and their Unreal Engine. So it’s this, uh, what’s happening here is there’s hybrid, they’re calling it hybrid front projection technology. And what it does is there are these two projectors, there are backups of each other that are actually taking feedback from the animatronics position in real time and is then projected back in real time. So if you can imagine if there’s a delay with the animatronic figure, or for some reason it stops moving, um, that projection mapping will not go away from the figure. It’ll be perfectly mapped to the figure always, um, as it is literally taking the feedback from the animatronic in real time from its exact position and then projecting back to it exactly where it is, the updated face. Um, it is the first time that they’re doing projection mapping on a moving figure at Walt Disney Imagineering. It’s used, it’s done through an entirely new technique that I just described a bit, and it’s using patented technology that has it lined up perfectly to the figure every single time. And what’s really cool is that it actually uses markers that are used for calibration. This is used for projection mapping technology, but the markers are actually hidden in plain sight on the pirates bandana. The only reason you can’t see it is because it is only visible under UV light. So at the end of the day, when they’re doing maintenance, they can use UV light. Look at the the markers on the bandana bandana and make sure that everything is lined up perfectly. And then turn off the UV lights. And then you have no idea as you’re passing by that pirate that there is those those markers hidden in plain view, but not visible to the human eye. So that’s the technology that is being used here. Now, if you look at the videos, if you’ve maybe queued it up as you’re listening to this episode, if you look at the videos that are showing this figure, I will say it is looking at it much closer than you will get the chance to see in person. So when I went on the attraction, I didn’t film it because I really just wanted to completely immerse myself. I had already read the reviews online and the initial comments, and I just wanted to completely immerse myself in the moment, in the experience and see it with my own eyes. So I will say that looking at it from a distance, it looks so much better than when you’re looking at it up close through a very zoomed in, high quality image. So when you are passing by, I will say that the imagery fits a lot better. And even the face, which might look a little off as you’re looking at it on a camera or on a video, it does not play out that way in person. It is actually very seamless, and it looks like it’s a part of the animatronic. You really can’t tell that it is projection mapped, except of course sort of like your brain saying logically, this is clearly not an animatronic practical effect. Like this has got to be digital just because of the way that his face moves. And I can only imagine where Disney will go with this technology, which perhaps I’ll make a couple of predictions in this episode, but I will say that again, seeing this in person to the average guests, not the Disney fan who understands the lore of the attraction. Um, it adds to the story. It is really not that striking of a difference when you compare it to the atmosphere around it, because it doesn’t really look as digital as you think it might would as you’re passing by because of the distance, because of the size of the animatronic and where it’s positioned because of the lighting. There’s just this combination of factors as you’re physically riding through it that doesn’t make it look that way. I will say the only thing that I did not really care for was the voice. Um, I thought the voice could have been a little bit more akin to some of the other pirates on the attraction. I might have to go through and ride it again, but it sounded a little different than I would have expected. Perhaps that was just what I was expecting versus what I went and experienced in reality. Either way, that was the only thing that I was like, oh, I’m not not a huge fan of the voice, but, um, you know, writing through it again, I’m sure it’s one of those things that I’m perhaps being a little overly critical going through this the first time and sort of like as an Imagineering fan, trying to think about every single detail that was executed. And that’s just because I didn’t think it really matched some of the other voices of the pirates you hear throughout the rest of the experience. It just was a little bit jarring for me compared to the other pirates. On the attraction that you experience a little bit later on. So the other thing that a lot of people will mention is that it just doesn’t fit the or a lot of the naysayers will say it just doesn’t fit the atmosphere of this part of the attraction. Um, I actually have to say, you know, while this part of the attraction is historically for the majority of its existence, nearly sixty years of existence was again, a very static place with just a few moving gags and some lighting effects here and there. Um, I don’t mind the animation in this space because I don’t think it’s done. It’s overly done. I think it’s one little animated piece and an otherwise static set that still maintains the atmosphere, but adds to the story. Um, and it definitely draws your eye as you’re passing by. Whereas before you might have been a little bit more passive, kind of looking, looking left or right at the different scenes here, it definitely captures your attention and it draws your eye and therefore it’s helping you to focus in on the story of the attraction. So from an atmospheric perspective, I think it fits. If they reverted back to the classic skeleton, I would be okay with that too. I think there are other places that this could fit. It could fit really well at Magic Kingdom in Walt Disney World as you’re going around. Again, that initial scene, um, you know, already there we have a skeleton with a sword through his chest, uh, over by this, this chest, this treasure chest. And you can see those, you know, the crabs on the beach. Um, and these and the, the other, the other animals on the beach is sort of going around towards that drop. So it could fit there too. But then at the same time, we’ve got just beyond that, a very animated, you know, the strobe lights showing the, the pirate captain skeleton steering this ship through the storm. Um, so it might be too close to that other really dynamic piece that draws your attention as you’re, as you’re passing by. Um, but I do think that this fits here. I just know that it’s taking some getting used to for a lot of Disney fans, understandably. Uh, and is it, you know, is it something that the original Imagineers would have wanted? I don’t know, because this technology was not even possible back then. They did have audio animatronics for sure, but ones that could transform from skeletons back to humans, back to skeletons. That was not possible. So they couldn’t realistically convey the same story in the same way. And despite what they might have thought back then, it’s a question of what’s right for today and for today’s audiences. And I think this does add a small enhancement to the attraction, something different to try something that could easily be reverted back, something that didn’t offend me. Like I thought I actually enjoyed it. Like I walked again, except for the voice. Like I went through it and I said, I said to myself and I said to Joanna, I’m like, why is everyone complaining about this? Like, it’s it was not that big of a deal to me. It was actually a pretty cool update. And I loved the technology that is being used here. So the implications like what can Disney do with this? So clearly the call here or the takeaway from this is that Disney can animate audio animatronics in real time. So think about how they can transform an animatronics face an animatronics body. Think about what they do with some of the special effects on Pirates of the Caribbean battle for the sunken treasure, which would be another great place to insert this type of figure. Think about some of the updates they do there, and they could perhaps change some of the, uh, live pirates into Davy Jones’s crew in real time using this projection mapping. Right? Or think about what they could do with any other character who might need to transform into something else, which would be either only possible through a Pepper’s Ghost effect, or lighting effects or mirror effects. Like they could do this in real time on the animatronic itself, without changing or using changing animatronics, or using mirrors or using lighting in a particular way. And they could update it over time. And it just shows that they really can do a lot with this technology. And it goes to show what they’ve been accomplishing with their partnership with Epic Games. I know this is a really long review. This is about twenty minutes long, but I wanted to provide a little more context, a little more detail, and my in-depth opinion about an analysis of this update and again, having seen it with my own eyes. Now, thinking about it for the last two months, how do I feel about it? A couple of months later, I give it my seal of approval. I think that it definitely fits where it is. I see where the Imagineers are going with this, and I think that for especially most guests who are floating through, um, it’s going to add to the story and paint a much clearer picture of, especially for, you know, for kids what’s happening here. Um, and the fact that there is this cursed treasure that’s, we’re going from the past to it’s going from the present, seeing what eventually happens to those who find the cursed treasure to then going into the past to those classic scenes from Pirates of the Caribbean. Let me know your thoughts if you have been on this attraction, and if you haven’t experienced the new version of it yet. Um. If you have any opinions, let me know your thoughts. But I just wanted to provide my review and an update on the technology that’s being used here and give some more context for those who did not get to experience it yet. Welcome back to Imagination Central. Before you exit this episode, remember to follow Imagination Skyway on social media and share the show with anyone who might enjoy listening to our program. Remember that you can access ad free episodes and bonus content at patreon dot com slash Imagination Skyway, which is also a great way to support the show. 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