Vision Pro Could Make History and Save Disney's Muppet Vision 3D Attraction

The Vision Pro could be in trouble. Reports say sales are slow and Apple may stop producing the high priced headset soon. But there is a way Apple can turn things around and make history. Dare I say even change the world. Apple could do something with the Vision Pro that has never been done before. Yes. Does this have anything to do with the Muppets? Why? Yes, sir. It does. Apple's Vision Pro could save the Muppets. Disney could work with Apple to preserve Jim. He's final project, an attraction that is closing at Walt Disney World called up at Vision 3d. And if you want to hear more about why this isn't so far fetched. Well, boy, have we got a video for you today? It's the one more thing show with our very special guest star, Mr Scott Stein. Hey Bridget, sorry to cut you off. Can I try that thing on? Sure. How's that? Mm. Oh, wow. The things I can see recently Disney announced it will close Muppet Vision 3d. This is a 33 year old attraction at the Hollywood Studios theme park or guests enter a theater, they put on 3D glasses and watch a 15 minute Muppet show that blends 3d visual tricks with animatronics and live actors and it holds some notable tech history. It was one of the final things Jim Henson worked on before he died in 1990. And Henson is credited with creating the first 3d animated puppet called Waldo. OK. And what Rex is doing is he's taking these moves that I'm doing with my hand and converting it into Waldo on the screen with the Muppet Vision attraction. Gone Disney wants to use that space to build a new land themed to the monsters inc movie franchise. But with the closing of the attraction, Disney also said it wants to find a way to keep it alive writing quote. We are having creative conversations and exploring ways to preserve the film and other parts of the experience for fans to enjoy in the future. Now, of course, Muppets are beloved and people would want to see the film again. But what makes this a challenge to preserve is that the characters in the 3d film have interaction with an animal characters in the seats. And at times things are happening behind you or characters are running down the aisles just saving the film portion would lose a lot of the in person gags. But what if before this building is demolished, 3d cameras are used to record the physical portions of the show from the point of view of the guest in the seat. So you would be sitting there looking all around you as the movie plays, you turn your head and you see the other elements all while wearing a vision pro at home. Now, this is where I bring in my CNET colleague, Scott Stein, who has much experience with all things mixed reality and immersive entertainment. And he wrote about how Disney should do this to preserve the legacy of the show. So thanks Scott for joining me. Do you think this show could live inside a vision pro Yeah, absolutely. And in fact, Disney has already been investing in VR for years. They had tales from the Galax edge Vader Immortal were Star Wars experiences on the quest Tales from the galaxy's edge parallel, the galaxy's edge experience on the park. Then they also invested in a location based VR entertainment thing near the parks which you and I both did the void. Yeah, which was great. We had to put on a whole rig and go through a Star Wars experience. There was a, a wreck. It Ralph experience, there was a marvel experience. So they've been thinking about this and then they, they're early partners with Apple on the Vision Pro, the Disney Plus app. That's movies and 3D movies. And you have a virtual environment that you can sit in. Now it's, you know, tattooing or a Disney Theater or Monsters Inc, but you could do others. And that goes exactly to your question, which is you know, make something more interactive around you. You could do the Muppet Vision 3d movie in a VR headset or a Vision pro but maybe make the environment truly interactive right now. Nobody is really doing that much of that surprisingly. But I feel like it could totally be done. Then you could have the interactive Statler Waldorf, the Penguins, you could turn around and see the Swedish chef and maybe even do something to the screen. And that would, you know, that would be a foot in the door for Disney exploring archiving immersive experiences like that. When the Vision Pro was announced, Bob Iger was part of that announcement, there was already a relationship between Apple and Disney. But to your point, yeah, we haven't seen a real theme park type of reimagining having the theme park in the headset. So that to me is another step. I mean, yes, you mentioned Galaxy Edge video game which references the theme park. But would this be really a novel thing? Well, and the other questions, would it be worth it? You know, would it be good enough because it would be novel? But then how many people are really buying vision pros right now? But a lot of people have quests, but they're mostly for video games. But eventually, if you have more affordable headsets that look really good in the displays, then you could maybe have something like that, that more people could try and it actually might be around the home that you go. Hey, I want to try that too. So with the vision pro, the movies that you might watch are they hug around you but they don't go all the way around yet. Correct. No, I mean, there are 360 degree movies out there previously but their immersive video format kind of wraps around to here and then movies. But if you turn around in the movie theater, I mean, you could look around, there's just nothing back there or sometimes there, there might be a scan of virtual seats in those environments. So you could do that and then turn around and see the movie, but nobody's done really interesting stuff that could be there for you. If you were to turn around, it's cool to think about. But will people pay for this? You think, or would it be just a free thing that Disney might do? I mean, I would pay for it. Yeah, it's a good question also, you know, really, what are they getting out of it? Some of these experiences they've done like uh some of these interactive ones, one on the Vision Pro that's Marvel were free. And the idea was it kind of just is an experiment and it would raise interest and awareness. Maybe they do this in Disney plus and kind of use it as an extra. Get people interested in using headsets or make people think about the parks or maybe they do it as a stand alone or maybe, I mean, what if you start a whole series of these and had classic experiences and then paid for each experience in the app memories. But you can relive them, honey. I shrink the audience. Oh, I remember that one too. Yeah, we do all sorts of ones like that. Like all these closed attractions that were like 3d, you know, bugs life. Um, if stuff to be a bug, if that eventually closes, then you could keep that one in there. Keep the past alive. But in our headsets, it's a, it's a dream. That's what they're there for and more people are going to be doing this. There are, there are more experiences like burning man and other things that people are trying to preserve in virtual environments. Now, like many companies, Disney uses virtual reality in their research and development. In my past reporting on the theme parks, I talked with some imagineers that use it when they're building rides and lands as a tool. But if you're looking to this headset as something more practical for the general public at home, the real success I feel is going to be using this as a memory time machine. The newer iphones can record 3d videos that appear lifelike as these spatial videos. It was the biggest. Wow thing for me when I used the device, seeing my own kids play in front of me again was so much better than just playing the movie on a phone. Now, home movies that feel like they're happening in front of you. They achieve another level of emotional connection because they tap into this unique nostalgia, the same kind of nostalgia we feel when we think about things like our childhood theme parks and, well, the Muppets, I'm a nerd. I booked an upcoming trip to Disney to see the show one last time and you know what, I'm going to walk through the lobby and use my iphone to record spatial videos of the space and just maybe it'll be a little sweeter memory when it's in that format. What can I say? We should all keep believing companies might use tech to do something cool like this and put it forever in a vision pro. Write your own comment on what else we could preserve with mixed reality headsets. What memories might get you to invest in a vision pro whatever the next vision pro might become. And a special thanks for watching us here every week. This is the 1/100 episode of one more thing and it's not the end we've done just what we set out to do. Thanks to the lovers, the dreamers and you catch you next time.