from Don Carson Blog: Theme Park & Virtual World Design
March 8th, 2021
1. Meet Expectations, Then Exceed Them
Once the stage is set, then, surprise them with the unexpected.
2. Appeal & Reassurance
Everything about the appearance should reassure your audience that their experience will be consistent in both design and quality.
3. Setting Influences How We Relate to a Narrative
Be aware of how the setting influences the emotions of how we related to places, objects, and events.
4. Composition & Staging Matter
Using theatrical lighting and staging point your audience to those areas and details that are most important to the story you are telling them.
5. Contrast Environments
The transition from one place to the next can be enhanced by how the two areas contrast each other in volume, lighting, color, etc.
6. Cause & Effect
Like the setup for a joke, suggest a punchline is imminent or has just been delivered to suggest an event is about to take place or has just occurred.
7. The Place Where it Happened
When recreating a historic or literary environment, place your audience in the exact spot where it happened.
8. Shared Experience with Context
The secret appeal of a theme park is that these places and attractions are enhanced by the fact that it is being shared.
9. Effect the Environment, Be Affected by the Environment
Whether as simple as opening a door or pushing a button, being able to make changes to the environment allows the visitor to create their own narrative and memories about the place they are experiencing.
10. Take it Home
The phrase “Exit through the gift shop” is both a way to make money and a way for the visitor to bring home with them a tangible artifact from their experience.
Full article:
(Don Carson is an amazing talent, whose brilliant work for WDI brought forth the world of Mickey’s Toontown at Disneyland – his blog is incredibly informative)
