animatronicappreciation

[animatronicappreciation]

At the kraay Farms Corn Maze! They also have a chicken piano with the same chickens.

---

Aww, how cute! The chickens remind me a lot of the chickens from The Muppets!! I love how there's just a disembodied voice singing along with the chicken clucks xD

-- Mod Possum

#submission #revengeofgojira #kraay farms corn maze #singing chicken show #mod possum

[animatronicappreciation]

The Philadelphia zoo has an exhibit on right now called Staying Power with a couple rudimentary animatronics of dinosaurs and bugs. They're not advanced at all but they're still cool. I took a couple short videos if you want them !

Absolutely! Go ahead and send them our way, we'd love to feature them!

-- Mod Possum

#ask #asks #mod possum #mod post #anonymous

[animatronicappreciation]

Hey can you talk a little about Dolli Dimples animatronic?

Sure! So Dolli Dimples was a cabaret character at Pizza Time Theatre. Her original VA, Donna Miller, was an actual piano bar performer that the PTT execs found and asked to be a VA for them. Donna Miller then performed the Dolli I showtape, which is my personal favorite of the two. Dolli II was performed by Lady Bianca, who also voiced Sally Sashay. (Please don't try to contact Lady Bianca; she wants nothing to do with the fandom anymore.) Their voices are very similar, but Donna Miller's voice has a deeper richness to it, in my opinion. Fun fact, Donna Miller was only 19 when she performed Dolli I!

Dolli was first installed at Kooser Road, which was the second PTT to open. She was a latex character at first, much like the portrait bots, but there was only ever one latex Dolli produced (to my knowledge), and all the other Dollis were the cyberamic version we know and love today.

Dolli was a bit different from other CEC characters in that she was made exclusively for adult consumption. (Artie Antlers was much the same, but B.B. Bubbles was much more child-friendly than either of them.) She was big, boisterous, raunchy, and incredibly flirtatious. If a hippo could ever possibly have any sort of sex appeal, that would be Dolli. She flirted with the audience, she talked about her numerous ex-husbands, she had pretty significant breasts... as Dolli put it herself, "there's a lot of Dolli to see!"

Speaking of Dolli's breasts, I want to address something that's a bit of a controversy in the fandom. Yes, Dolli Dimples had a breast movement, but it's not what you think. It wasn't like she had jiggle physics or whatever. Her breast movement was a breathing movement, much like the birds in the Tiki Room have. Since she's so busty, it makes sense that you would be able to see her chest rise and fall with her breathing. It's not anything lewd, I promise.

The only Dolli Dimples that's intact today (the Dolli owned by Captain Slappy) actually doesn't have her breast movement working. The piece that moved the breasts was a lever that pressed up the particle board the breasts were mounted to in order to create the movement, but the particle board on Slappy's Dolli has pretty much disintegrated, so the lever pushing up doesn't really do anything anymore. He's decided not to restore the particle board because the movement's repetition ends up tearing Dolli's dress, and since this is the only working Dolli in existence, he wants to keep her dress intact.

If you want to see a Dolli in action during her heyday, [here's] some footage from Charlie Cheese in Australia. You can see her breast movement in action in this footage!

-- Mod Possum

#dolli dimples #pizza time theatre #pizza time theater #captain slappy #chuck e cheese #cabaret #charlie cheese #ask #asks #mod possum

[animatronicappreciation]

Hello recently i have been working on some projects on mechanical engineering and pneumatics and i am looking to buy a showbiz pizza animatronic for a fair price, does anybody know where I can get one

We've been getting a lot of asks like this as of late. The answer is basically you've gotta make the right connections. You've gotta know collectors who are in the game. We personally don't own any animatronics because of how pricey they are. A "fair price" for any one of these characters is in the thousands of dollars these days, especially Showbiz characters since they have a lot more movements than Cyberamics. Even the Animatronic Experimenter's Kit by Creative Engineering, back when it was still being produced, was over a thousand dollars. That character only had one movement!

Right now, there's a Fatz on eBay for $13k. It's local pickup only, though. So if you wanna make a roadtrip to Mission, Kansas, you can do that and get Fatz if you've got the money.

-- Mod Possum

#mod possum #ask #asks

[animatronicappreciation]

is this blog dead? its been 3 months since the last post

Not dead, I promise!! I just have really bad ADHD so sometimes I just kind of forget to exist for long stretches of time :')

-- Mod Possum

#ask #asks #mod post #mod possum

[animatronicappreciation]

Hello!

I've been looking into this very obscure pizza restaurant called either Fuzzy Wuzzy's Wizard Wonderland or Fuzzy Wuzzy Wizzerd's Wonderland of Food and Fantasy. I know these names are insane but I am being 100% serious here lol

They had an animatronic band, and only 2 photos of them exist.

We also have no footage or showtapes, and I don't even know when they shut down-but due to a certain lawsuit I doubt they would've made it to the 90s.

The legal document regarding that case also mentions a 2nd location being opened, but the ownership was "unclear"

https://youtu.be/gWkh_mx85kc

Also put up a YouTube video with all the known information, but basically what I wanna ask is:

Do these look like retrofits of anything to you, or were they wholly original?

I'm probably one of the only people in the world who's this interested in these animatronics, but I wanna ask questions where I can

Thank you for listening!

Oh, wow! This is really interesting! The only info I could find on these guys other than your video is a Reddit post about them, so it seems like this is truly an enigma!

These guys don't look like retrofits to me. According to the Reddit post, it's thought that these guys were produced in-house, and I'd have to agree, since I don't recognize the mech shapes here.

Based on your video, the songs that were made sound incredibly juvenile, like preschool-level. So their target audience was probably very young kids. Kind of like modern Chuck E Cheese, I suppose, but even CEC's current songs aren't that juvenile. It's like Cool Cat level little kiddy xD So that's probably why people don't remember it-- it wasn't really a hip place to hang out like CEC and Showbiz tried to be in the 80s.

I'm pretty intrigued about this case now, though! If you're able to find anything out about these guys, feel free to let me know! It's a shame that this place closed before the advent of widely spread personal video cameras.

-- Mod Possum

#ask #asks #Fuzzy Wuzzy #Fuzzy Wuzzy Wizzerd #Fuzzy Wuzzy Wizzerd Wonderland #mod possum

[animatronicappreciation]

I'm sorry to send two asks in one day, but yknow that weird Muppet band you brought up a few times?

I think I found one.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/145113332282?hash=item21c96dba3a:g:wQIAAOSwD3pkd6Uu&amdata=enc%3AAQAIAAAA4P37Bdg9%2FA0N3Ze1GptoJXhkGYlcFdD4YOaz8DuOLLClRKLNwLsMz8uQFygVH9dk6GkSzwz%2Bmr0DlaijhaHWdhl7NodPnuHPCg%2BWvYp%2BgxP5PmcCN9GIcrqrZQiOBEMVZjKjsunbRuc9val%2FpPvLEpnuuUIGARB5gsqOk7Gin3GTodEpZ%2BCup%2B7PhQzpFzH1Mv4vrh5SUxwkauIXPihjxI%2Beu1cWlXqwAPiyTZB1sleZvp%2Fc1dxMWcCdYSYF3kdjB036dYSDrASKdjPotAck57ymngZvvIkN2Pp%2FywlvdCfI%7Ctkp%3ABFBMiuiZsqdi

I won't be buying it myself though, I don't have the money and I don't know what I'd do with it.

[link]

Oh hey! That's a Chirpie! They were made by the now-defunct Robot Country USA! We see those on this blog now and again :) Here's a post that our dear Mod Rat made about them!

I find it interesting that the pictures in the eBay link you've sent us don't really show any animatronic parts. There's just like a big box with a speaker for the chest! Very peculiar!

Here are the pictures (image descriptions in alt text):

-- Mod Possum

#chirpy #chirpie #chirpy band #chirpie band #robot country usa #ebay #photos #mod possum

[animatronicappreciation]

Hey!! I just discovered your blog last night after I went down the animatronic rabbit hole, and I was super excited to see you mention the Rainforest Cafe at Grapevine Mills!! I’m actually fortunate enough to also live pretty close to that location, and I went as a kid and got absolutely terrified of the talking tree… I think her name was Tracy the Tree?? Idk, can you tell me if I’m going crazy or not? I actually went to the Galveston location about six years ago and saw a big tree with a face, but it seemed to be deactivated.

Hey there! Yep, you're right, our tree friend at the Rainforest Cafe is named Tracy Tree! She's a talking tree that gives out rainforest facts! I've personally never been afraid of her, I always considered her a friend when I was a kid (and honestly she's still my homegirl), but I can totally see how she might be a bit creepy to some people lol!

Here's a great video of her! Sadly, there aren't many good videos of Tracy online, and there's a handful of creepypastas based around her for some reason, so it seems that more people are creeped out by her than those who find her endearing.

Grapevine Mills is a great mall!! I actually work at a store there now :D Hey, if you wanna document Tracy for us, you can totally head to Rainforest Cafe and take some video of her, send it to us, and we'll feature it here!! :D

I hope the Tracy at the Galveston location was just under refurbishment when you were there! Sometimes the animatronics need a bit of a spa day, so they're given a facelift in the form of maintenance or replacement of cosmetics.

-- Mod Possum

#rainforest cafe #tracy tree #ask #asks #mod possum

[animatronicappreciation]

Not sure if anyone’s shared these but the Chicago zoo had an exhibit with animatronic “ice age beasts” I thought they were so cool! Some of them were HUGE. Not super intricate but fun none the less!

Oh, I love these! Now I'm even more disappointed I couldn't make it to the zoo last time I was in Chicago though XD - Mod Coyote

#submission #Chicago zoo #chicago #illinois

[animatronicappreciation]

Animatronic Dinosaurs at Jurassic Nest Food Hall at Singapore's Gardens By The Bay!

I really love animatronics so I wanted to submit these. They peform every hour from 12pm-8pm every day and are in good condition!

They look so cool! I don't think I had heard of Gardens By The Bay before, but I looked at their website and have decided I'd love to visit it some day. Thank you for submitting these! - Mod Coyote

#dinosaurs #garden by the bay #singapore

[animatronicappreciation]

Can’t stop thinking about how someone finally snuck into the Excalibur casino in vegas and copped pictures of the dragon animatronic that’s been left to rot in his lair for almost two decades now.

#decay #Excalibur

[animatronicappreciation]

Mod Possum once again reblogs to the wrong blog! Oopsie daisy! ;)

https://youtu.be/1UAM4M8YCzI

It's the b b bubbles the elephant animatronic in action working

So, fun fact, this actually isn't an animatronic! This is indeed a set of BB Bubbles cosmetics (the only ones that have been recovered, to my knowledge), but Jenn Waitt (the older woman in the video) is actually a very talented puppet-maker and has transformed our friend BB into a marionette! I've seen her perform BB in person, back during CheeseVention X, when she was unveiled to the public! Sadly, you can't really find video footage from that anymore, since a lot of the old fandom members have wiped their YouTube accounts of the event for whatever reason, but let me tell you: it was AMAZING seeing the performance in person!

Here's the video in question (performance starts at 15:30):

-- Mod Possum

#B.B. Bubbles #pizza time theatre #Jenn Waitt #shiny happy jenn #mod possum

[animatronicappreciation]

Big thank you to @parappa-lammy for finding the footage!

This should’ve been an obvious one to me, but I misremembered this video as having the old Warblettes in it. That was the other portrait video, though! ;) Oops!

-- Mod Possum

Do you have any videos of The Mopsey Sisters performing?

Hi there! I have no idea where to find this footage, but @pizza-and-burgertime has an amazing GIF of them in action!

Pardon the confederate flag, of course... we don't endorse such things around these parts.

Functionally, they were identical to the balcony Warblettes, just with latex masks instead of fabric. If I had to guess, I'd say that's ultimately why they were phased out. Time is not kind to latex masks, so having to replace them whenever they ripped, became brittle, or melted would've been a pain in the rear. Another reason they might've been discontinued is because they're just so uncanny looking in comparison to the Warblettes. The Warblettes are more friendly and inviting, in my opinion-- especially the more common crow variant.

The interesting difference between these two functionally identical sets of characters is that the Warblettes had googly eyes glued to their eyes for some motion, whereas the Mopsey Sisters appear to have had flat sequins sewn onto their eyes for the motion of their pupils, giving them a Cookie Monster effect when they rocked back and forth.

The funny thing about the Mopsey Sisters is they weren't ragdolls-- as seen in this promotional picture, they were literal mops with heads and arms!

So that's a little uncanny and bizarre! I honestly think I would've been scared of these characters if I had come across them as a child.

-- Mod Possum

#portrait show #pizza time theatre #pizza time players #update #mod possum

[animatronicappreciation]

Thanks to our friends at the Daniels Wood Land YouTube channel, we now have some great footage of our dear friend, the Heckler Barker Bear! He's been known to pop up on this blog from time to time, and people love to give us updates about how their local Barker Bear is doing, so it feels fitting to post this! ;) He may not be the most advanced animatronic out there, but he's still very charming to us! We love you, Heckler Barker Bear!

-- Mod Possum

#daniels wood land #heckler barker bear #mod possum #Youtube

[animatronicappreciation]

I have a strange request/question .

do you have any photos of Rolfe but without clothes? i dont mean without the fur or face mask, i just mean his clothing. im trying to draw something (not nsfw! /gen) and i dont actually think ive ever seen what his stomach/chest area looks like without his shirt/suit.

Hi there, Felix! So, under that shirt and vest? Rolfe is a nakey boy.

As you an see from this still from the Concept Unification installation tape, Rolfe actually doesn't HAVE anything under his shirt and vest! It's just his fiberglass body shell! It wouldn't really make sense to put any fur there since no one would see it anyway, and it would likely get matted from the shirt.

Sorry if this is a disappointment! But if you wanna draw him shirtless, I'd just make him look like any other wolf-- fluffy!

-- Mod Possum

#rock afire explosion #rolfe dewolfe #no cosmetics #concept unification #ask #mod possum

[animatronicappreciation]

oooh youre back im so excited!! im a jungle jims employee, so i spend a lot of time looking at the different animatronics around the store. i was wondering how much you know about some of them? specifically two sets: the collection of robin hood animatronics, and a weird table i keep passing labelled "Big Bertha" with a counter, a mouth, and some giant gloved handsbon it. I've been googling around for the second one especially, and it seems like smth chuck e cheese related but I havent seen anything quite like it yet?

i can get pics/videos of any and all of the animatronics on display if needed/wanted also!

Hi, anon! Having pictures of what you're talking about would be greatly helpful, since I've never been to Jungle Jim's myself! I know that they do have some old PTT animatronics, but I also know that some of them have been retired throughout the years, so it'll help a lot to have pictures!

-- Mod Possum

#ask #anon #mod post #mod possum #jungle jim's

[animatronicappreciation]

Hey I got a few more of this guy, from the shooting gallery on Miner's Pier in Seattle. I'm sorry he wasn't running the day that I went up or I would have gotten some video of him. Love your site!!

--

There's our buddy, Heckler Barker Bear!! :D We LOVE this guy!! He's become sort of an unofficial mascot for this blog with how often we see him!! :D Thanks for the submission!!

-- Mod Possum

#submission #heckler barker bear #daniels wood land #mod possum