Alton Towers... University Degree?

TakeYourMedicine said:

I don't feel like you can really get much out of theme park design through textbooks, it's much better to get involved in any way that you can, see a lot of different parks, have ideas and keep an open mind. Unless it's specifically Disney or Universal where you want to be.

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I agree wholeheartedly that this is the idyllic approach, but I don't see any theme park education course that gives you the kind of stuff that we're talking about; perhaps it's a case of not enough competent theme park companies trying to make use of and generate more talent. You're always going to be following a restrictive company approach though, there's no company out there that sits back and lets you get on with your hearts desire; even if you are lucky enough to be in a big role in a project, you're never really going to have the 'proper' creative freedom that being an all round attraction designer should involve, unless you are some sort of multi billionaire who happens to have a fair bit of experience of scenic artistry, engineering, are an AV expert, and have a strong understanding of landscaping... I suppose.
The closest thing you could do to that would be working freelance and having contacts with creative companies, which I'm sure you are well aware of, and gaining knowledge through doing that. None of those companies provide any sort of education scheme though, and most of the time it's going to be about meeting the demands of the external client/theme park rather than learning stuff that allows you to improve yourself.

Ultimately though, if Merlin had done things right, an education scheme that offers a hell of a lot more could of been offered. But here we are.

Also, am I allowed to say I have a tiny soft spot for DBGT? The story reminds me of Fallout, and I really like the building exterior and the intro with the projections. Sound/Audio is a little off (unsure of what system they use but it's can be a little jarring at points, maybe it's the frequency) but overall I actually don't mind the ride! I think it would of been a whole lot better had they gone for physical rather than digital illusions, and had it been a haunted house roller coaster hybrid with intermittent drops in between different scenes instead of having the poorly done maze in between.

Sauron97 said:

I don't see any theme park education course that gives you the kind of stuff that we're talking about

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There doesnt need to be an education course for this sort of thing though, because it's much better learnt by experience. I agree that more parks should offer experience and look for good ideas/skills, rather than just looking at degrees alone. You'd learn far better from experience than any course, but it would just take longer and you'd need to go far out of your way to get it.

There are a whole range of things to explore in the theme park industry that people could go into after all, that's one brilliant thing about it.

Sauron97 said:

there's no company out there that sits back and lets you get on with your hearts desire; even if you are lucky enough to be in a big role in a project, you're never really going to have the 'proper' creative freedom that being an all round attraction designer should involve

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No project ever existed where a designer just goes and does whatever they personally want to, it will always be for the client's needs (their guests in this case) and taking into consideration all the parameters of the project. Solving those problems is most the job of design.

But the bad restrictions come when clients (especially Merlin) don't want what would be best for their project (or guests). They just want to pay as little as they can for as much profit return, treating contractors/designers as a kind of chore to be controlled.

Give a good brief and let designers design, let developers develop, etc. And manage the project well (often not easy on big projects), then it will be a success.

Part of what made John Wardley's projects good was that he gave good briefs, chose good people to design/build and then tried to allow teams to reach the best outcome, rather than vet and restrict each stage of the project according to a marketing survey or how much merchandise they can sell.

That's the reality of being an attraction developer/designer/builder I think. And yeah you could study that to an extent, but really it's all about the experience in the bigger picture.

I think we are in agreement in most aspects of this and this is just a little misunderstanding! I was simply speculating that no such course exists that would give the ideal theme park designing skills, and that options are sadly limited. One point though

TakeYourMedicine said:

No project ever existed where a designer just goes and does whatever they personally want to, it will always be for the client's needs (their guests in this case) and taking into consideration all the parameters of the project. Solving those problems is most the job of design.

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I'm not saying absolute anarchist level of freedom, I just mean huge amounts of creative freedom haha! You can't deny that Walt Disney had an incredible amount of freedom when he was designing his theme park. Granted he allocated roles and assembled a creative team (WED Enterprises), but he had a gigantic amount of control over the project when it comes to the creative process, his only semi major limitations were planning laws, financing and creating something that would confidently generate money. Essentially what I'm saying is, that there is no backdoor or education in to getting in to that kind of role.

When I got my first job in telly, it was under a new trainee scheme that was supposed to give us a B-Tech at the end of the 2 year contract. We were the first batch. Previously all new staff had been sent on an in-house intensive 6 month residential training course.

The guy who was supposed to be in charge of our training was just as new to this as we were. Aside from an initial 2 week course in how TV works, and occasionally being given a huge wad of photocopied tech sheets, we learnt everything from proper on the job training.

After about 8 months he gathered all 6 of us together for a meeting...
"Look, let's be frank here. I know you lot don't care about this B-Tech, and neither do I. You already know what you are doing, all that's left is to build up experience. Who wants to ditch the course all together?"

... Six hands instantly shot up.
And that was that.

We all knew that qualifications just for the sake of it are worthless compared to real job experience, and being able to say you learnt your trade from the best.

DiogoJ42 said:

We all knew that qualifications just for the sake of it are worthless compared to real job experience, and being able to say you learnt your trade from the best.

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At the end of the day, this is the truth! But sadly the world demands that we have to spend months listening to lecturers and countless hours scribbling and typing about theoretical concepts that we'll never end up using IRL!

Well that opens up the whole debate on how useless education can be in general. What is more important to learn in life? How to tell a Frenchman that the cat is sitting next to the table, or how to fill out a tax return?

Sauron97 said:

I was simply speculating that no such course exists that would give the ideal theme park designing skills, and that options are sadly limited.

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Yeah that's what I meant when I brought up the US theme park design course, although I dont think one specifically about theme parks is necessary anyway. There are many options for learning, just it's all in the experience.

There are lot of opportunities for experience, it just takes time and effort, and knowing where to find them. If it's something not exclusive to theme parks then youd be better off getting a qualification in that first (eg marketing, management, general design/building), but to apply it to theme parks you'd still need that strong hands on experience with the attraction industry.

As long as people got what it takes and don't just stay within Merlin forever, you could learn an enormous amount from little things. Im sure you could also find great experience at some Merlin parks or random smaller attractions, but it's just trickier to find those pockets, because most the time these are run to a minimum in this country.

DiogoJ42 said:

Well that opens up the whole debate on how useless education can be in general. What is more important to learn in life? How to tell a Frenchman that the cat is sitting next to the table, or how to fill out a tax return?

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Depends if you're gonna go to live in France or if you have any intentions of paying taxes I suppose

Linkedin is a very interesting place to see what career paths people have taken. Have a look at some of the Managements, job history. A lot of them aren't anything to do with leisure, let alone Theme Parks.