Audio-Animatronics

Audio-Animatronics (also known simply as AAs) are a form of mechatronic animatronics puppetry created by Walt Disney Imagineering and trademarked by the Walt Disney Company for use in designed shows and attractions at Disney theme parks.

Audio-Animatronics move and often synchronize with an audio soundtrack from an external sound system (generally a recorded speech or song), and are usually fixed to whatever supports them. They can sit and stand but cannot produce any form of locomotion.

An Audio-Animatronic differs from an android or robot in that it uses prerecorded movements and sounds, rather than responding to external stimuli.

Audio-Animatronics were originally a creation of Disney employee Lee Adams, who worked as an electrician. Walt Disney got a mechanical toy bird in New Orleans and found out how it worked, which served as the inspiration for Audio-Animatronics. An early robotic figure was the Dancing Man, created by Roger Broggie and Wathel Rogers, and modeled after a tap dancing routine by actor Buddy Ebsen.

Development of the first audio animatronic technology began in 1949 with the work of the giant squid for 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954).

The term "Audio-Animatronics" was first used commercially by Disney in 1961, was filed as a trademark in 1964, and was registered in 1967.^{[citation needed]}

The Audio-Animatronic show The Enchanted Tiki Room opened in 1963 at Disneyland. It is a room full of tropical creatures with eye and facial actions synchronized to a musical score entirely by electromechanical means. The Audio-Animatronic cast of the musical revue uses tones recorded on tape to vibrate a metal reed that closes a circuit to trigger a relay, which sends a pulse of electricity to a mechanism that causes a pneumatic valve to move part of the figure.

The movements of the attraction's birds, flowers, and tiki idols are triggered by sound. Figures' movements have a neutral "natural resting position" that the limb or part returns to when there is no electric pulse present. Other than this, the animation is a binary system, with only on/off moves, such as an open or closed eye. The same kind of technology was used for the head of Mary Poppins’ cane in Mary Poppins (1964).