Wicked Makers

Building Animatronic Mickey - Introduction

Added 2024-01-31 22:51:26 +0000 UTC

Welcome to our new Patreon series! If you saw the "Nightmare Mickey" animatronic build on YouTube, you'll be familiar with this project, and in these videos we'll work through not just how we made the animatronic stuff, but also how to fix the issues we had (and will continue to have...).

First and foremost, this is not a definitive, simple tutorial on how to build the perfect thing. This is an ongoing, work-in-progress project where we’ll continually share what is working and what isn’t, and how we go about improving it.

But Why?

As you saw in the YouTube video, it broke! Nothing we make is perfect and we’ll never claim that our way is the best or ideal way to do it. It’s just a way and as we learn and improve, we’ll discover better ways, and you can watch as we adapt our stuff to what we learn!

Can I Build Mickey Right Now?

Probably, but it won’t be easy to get him to move well. The 3D Print files for his head are GREAT so all the artistic stuff is good to go, but all of the mechanics are a work-in-progress. As you saw, they technically work, but have loads of issues that I’ll be attempting to solve here in this series.

However, if you want him in his current state and want to improve him on your own, everything is available HERE.

Is there a Roadmap? Long-Term Plans?

As of today? → Fix Mickey’s head, then build him a body. Along the way, test different ways to make it move, play with different motors, controllers, etc. and learn a million things.

What's next?

I think the next video will cover replacing the broken part in the neck and a walkthrough of how to put him back together. We'll also cover some new parts that weren't in the YouTube video and a quick breakdown of the Arduino setup.