Research Areas
At Disney Research, we've developed proficiency in a range of research areas, particularly in the following categories:
Computer Graphics
Our research competency in computer graphics is especially mature. Our entertainment businesses provide diverse target applications for our pioneering work. This allows us to achieve a rare level of cross-fertilization by juxtaposing real-time algorithms for the game studios with high-end techniques for the movie studios, achieving speed and directability in physical simulation, spanning visual styles from photorealistic to artistic, and blurring the boundaries between computer graphics and materials science.
Video Processing
A Disney story is often told through video, whether it's a movie, a serial, a newscast, or professional sports. This raises a gamut of research challenges with hard-hitting economic impact: for example, automating labor-intensive processes while preserving art directability, avoiding expensive reshoots by adding content-aware flexibility in postproduction, and adapting to a world with increasingly diverse devices.
Computer Vision
Guest interaction at theme parks, motion capture for studios, and sports visualization are just a few of the direct applications for our computer-vision research. We also perform research in which computer vision intersects with human-computer interaction, video processing, display technology, and optics: it plays a role in our work on input devices, content-aware video processing, projector-camera systems, and computational cinematography.
Robotics
In this arena, we're addressing a portfolio of research problems whose applications range from short-term improvements to long-term challenges. Ultimately, we envision a future in which robots interact with humans in complex, unpredictable environments. We're working toward this vision by addressing constituent problems in computer graphics, control techniques for humanoid robotics, and human-robot interaction. We also create opportunities of immediate, short-term interest intended to improve operational costs and maintainability.
Radio & Antennas, Wireless Communications
The unparalleled scale and density of Disney's physical venues give rise to wireless-research topics in relatively uncharted operating regimes, with cost structures that can amortize across tens to hundreds of millions of units. Our work focuses on the physics of radio and antennas—with applications both analog and digital—as well as the algorithms and protocols necessary for wireless networking. Our research agenda is inspired primarily by opportunities at Walt Disney Parks and Resorts and at ESPN.
Human-Computer Interaction
We're interested in the many ways computer interfaces can span the digital and tangible worlds, giving rise to qualitatively new experiences. Our agenda takes advantage of technologies that are relatively new in the commercial world, and whose interactions have not yet been fully explored. Our researchers invent new technologies for sensing touch and pose, as well as creating new sensory experiences such as haptic illusions.
Behavioral Sciences
Rigorous experimental study of human behavior fortifies our understanding of Disney's guests, primarily at Walt Disney Parks and Resorts. Many of our studies test novel hypotheses in the field of behavioral economics, which challenge classical assumptions that model economic decisions in terms of utility maximization. Our goals are to enhance guest satisfaction, test new business models, and further Disney's aims around social consciousness and sustainability.
Future Foci
Along with our progress in the areas above, we're also building expertise in speech and sound, artificial intelligence, machine learning, data mining, environmental science, materials, and displays.