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(THIS IS A WIP!)
Ruff The Lizard - Logs
Log 1 – Discovery
During construction of the Pizzaplex we managed to find what looks to be some sort of scrapped animatronic. It appears to be a giant lizard-like creature, though it’s hard to tell since it’s only half-built. It looks like it has been powered on before, most likely for some sort of movement tests. Overall, it still seems to be in good condition, the endoskeleton has sustained little to no damage.
Log 2 – Initial Repairs
Management has decided to make the lizard part of the new facility. They’re currently figuring out what attraction to build for it while we repair the thing. The first thing we noticed was the absence of a voicebox, a key feature in most animatronics. But looking at the endoskeleton’s head it seems that it was never intended for there to be one, so we’ll adapt and instead build a speaker into its chest. Motors at the base of the exterior head “shell” suggest that it was supposed to have something similar to a frill, therefore we have commissioned eight (8) LED plates that will be attached. The few body parts with exterior body plates were white, we’ve decided to keep it like that.
Log 3 – Attraction
The design department worked tirelessly to complete the lizard, now called “Ruff”, in time of the Pizzaplex’ grand opening, which is just a few months away. The attraction has been fully realized: Ruff is able to analyze and perfectly mimic any voice that it records, and then entertains children in an assortment of ways through that. The room the animatronic resides in has a second ceiling with holes in it, which he can poke his head through to illuminate the room with the yellow and red frill. The room itself has a very futuristic theme, contrasting the arcade look of the facility. The games children can play there are also a little different, instead of the regular arcade machines there’s things like air hockey and race arcade machines with actual seats and wheels. There’s also a snack bar that serves oddly colored foods and beverages. Obviously Ruff still has the spotlight, interacting with children constantly. Thanks to the large speaker occupying his chest cavity he can be heard from anywhere in the room.
Log 4 – Testing & Troubleshooting
Upon testing Ruff, we ran into a few problems. While the motors worked without a hitch, we noticed that thanks to the sheer size of some of the joints, the animatronic made some awful scraping noises when moving. If we greased the joints more it could lead to excessive maintenance costs and some of the grease might drip down onto the floor, which could be a hazard. After some thinking we have decided to swap nearly all joint parts with black rubber tubes. That way Ruff also becomes a little lighter.
While testing general movement we noticed that the feet tend to slip on the ground. Though he can regain balance fairly easily, we can’t risk him slipping while climbing around in the ceiling and possibly falling onto a guest. Replacing the claws with the same rubber material that the joints are now made of proved to solve the issue.
But the largest problem involved the animatronic’s ability to speak, or rather lack thereof. It has become very much apparent that synching the jaw movement with the sounds of the speaker is near impossible to do properly. There is either a delay or the jaw doesn’t move realistically at all. We have made the decision to limit the number of total movements the jaw makes per sound, which cuts down on processing time and therefore almost completely removes the delay. It might not look as realistic, but from what we’ve seen it’s still fun to see this thing talk.
Log 5 – First Week After Opening
