Olympic Mascots

Creature Technology Co. was commissioned to create three animatronic mascots for the XXII Olympic Winter Games Opening and Closing Ceremonies in February 2014. The gigantic and yet incredibly cute and life-like Polar Bear, Leopard and Hare skated, skied and snowboarded their way into the hearts of every audience member watching in the stadium and at home (about 3 billion of them)! The Bear had a particularly prominent role in the Closing Ceremony, “blowing out” the Olympic Cauldron to signify the official end of the Sochi Olympic Winter Games, and shedding a tear.

FUN FACTS
- The mascots were designed and built in our workshop in Melbourne, Australia.
- Approximately 50 people worked on the build of the three mascots.
- All three mascots were designed digitally using Maya, ZBrush and SolidWorks.
- The performance of the three mascots is a hybrid of pre-­recorded sequences and live performance, which allows for a combination of precision playback and flexibility in a live setting.
- The tallest mascot, the Bear, stands 8m tall. The Leopard is a similar size whilst the Hare is 6m tall.
- There was 270kgs of fur on the three mascots combined.
- All three mascots had the full spa treatment, including a haircut, colour and blow­‐dry using real hair dryers!
- All three mascots packed down into 7 x 40ft shipping containers and were airfreighted to their destination.
- There are hydraulic cylinders in the body of each mascot, as well as a number of smaller electric servos.
- The Bear has around 30 axes of movement and 16 servo motors in his face alone.
- The servo motors used in all three mascots are made by the same supplier that provides NASA with their servos.
- There are two people on board in the chassis of each mascot: one driver and one puppeteer.
- The mascots combined weight is 8.6 tons (Bear: 3,340kg, Hare: 2,425kg, Leopard: 2,835kg).
- There is a camera in the nose of the bear to aid the driver and puppeteer, and cameras at the front and rear of the chassis trained on the mascot to aid the puppeteer.
- The Bear’s eyeballs are the size of a basketball, whilst the Leopard and Hare’s eyes are twice that size.
- The chassis on all three mascots is identical.
- The Olympic Committee issued a press release estimating the global television audience at 3 billion people for the Opening Ceremony.
- We received an official request to make the Bear shed a tear 10 days before the Closing Ceremony. Our team on site did a great job pulling it off!