Author's note: This project was completed as a team assignment for DEA2510: History of Design Futures, a class taught by Chad Randl for the College of Human Ecology at Cornell University. My partner, the talented and theme park-savvy Justin Horst, and I were given the prompt of tracing the full history of a design trend. We chose to examine the theme park dark ride, not just in its modern conception but through its most basic and fundamental characteristics. Our final piece features a video narrative of this history and an accompanying writeup. The Sketchup model includes both original work and material taken from the Google Warehouse, used here under fair use guidelines.
The
Dark Ride: a Contemporary Definition
A
dark ride possesses three core characteristics:
- - A
narrative arc
- - Physical
movement through a space
- - Sense
of reality or immersion
This
definition excludes some experiences that are recognizably not dark rides. Examples
that are NOT dark rides:
- - Film
experiences alone, including motion simulators (no physical movement)
- - Museum
exhibits (no sense of reality or immersion)
- - Roller
coasters (no narrative arc)
