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Post by DollyPrince on Apr 22, 2017 2:32:01 GMT -7
Hello everyone, it has been a while. After waiting a while for shipping, he is finally here! T.T Bear is a knockoff of Teddy Ruxpin made by Taiwanese company Hong Da. He was one of my most sought after cassette talking toys, and now he is part of my collection.I love his design, he is one of the most beautiful talking bears to me. Mine is the creme coloured version, and he is the one with the tan box and no microphone. He has his original box and tape (English version), and is mostly working for now.. The eye motor is rather loud, the mouth movement isn't very smooth (even compared to normal), and his animation seems to be slowly failing at times. Sometimes he needs a tap on the head so his animation will start. I am thinking he needs lubrication. However, he is similarly built to Funny, his fur is not sewn, but glued to his head. There is a good chance glue is used elsewhere inside the head as well. This seems rather risky. I have taken a video of him and will upload it to a video sharing website as soon as my terrible internet connection lets me. In the meantime, here is a picture. I might use this as my new icon, it is just a beautiful picture!  I love the art on the box as well!  You can see him here with some of my collection also (including Jabbee, who I have not yet introduced.)  |
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Post by teddyruxpin24 on Apr 22, 2017 8:09:55 GMT -7
Wow, I'm so glad you got one! He's one of my favorite tape talkers too.
About the animation failing sometimes, you might just need to turn up the volume louder. The way T.T. works is how loud the cassette is controls his mouth, so he doesn't require any animation coding. I learned this through experiences with mine. If the volume is turned down too low, he doesn't hear the sounds to activate his mouth, and so it doesn't, or barely moves. Also another tip, don't move his mouth manually. I tried this with mine and his mouth broke. Luckily I was able to fix it though.
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Post by DollyPrince on Apr 22, 2017 8:48:20 GMT -7
Wow, I'm so glad you got one! He's one of my favorite tape talkers too. About the animation failing sometimes, you might just need to turn up the volume louder. The way T.T. works is how loud the cassette is controls his mouth, so he doesn't require any animation coding. I learned this through experiences with mine. If the volume is turned down too low, he doesn't hear the sounds to activate his mouth, and so it doesn't, or barely moves. Also another tip, don't move his mouth manually. I tried this with mine and his mouth broke. Luckily I was able to fix it though. I know he does not use animation coding. He works identical to Gabby Bear. However in the case of mine no matter how loud he is he fails sometimes. Even the eyes, which are not controlled by the loudness of the tape, sometimes need help (quick tap on the head) to work. Have you opened the head? Is there any other difficulties with that besides the fur being glued on? I assume he has a gear assembly inside, as it sounds that way when moving. |
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Post by BeachBear on Apr 25, 2017 3:53:13 GMT -7
How lovely!
If you're able, can you please upload some photos of his packaging so we can see what he says?
I like the cream colour as opposed to the tan, it's just different and suits his red bow tie nicely. If you do get around to opening him up, please share photos! It fascinates me to see how competing/knock off products did their animatronics.
Also, when you say he doesn't use animation coding, does he work similarly to the Playskool Teddy/ Mother Goose?
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Post by DollyPrince on Apr 25, 2017 15:03:30 GMT -7
Yes, I had another picture of the box with cute artwork, but it failed to upload from my tablet properly.
I will try again some time later.
PlaySkool Mother Goose and Teddy Ruxpin do use animation coding... They use RF frequencies, high tone for mouth movement, low tone for eye movement. Yes! Teddy and presumably BackPack Teddy use this identical method and the audio is compatible if converted. The low, vibrating PPM modulation is the only type of animation coding among the cassette talkers that is mostly exclusive to WoW.
Most knockoffs and cheaper competitors used only audio. What I mean is, the voice is recorded on one channel (for instance left), and the music and sound effects are recorded on the other channel (for instance right). The mouth motor will react to any audio on the left channel. And so it will appear in sync with the voice when the tapes are played. Because of this, knockoff tapes are usually interchangeable and work beautifully in each other. The eyes are in a mechanical loop, and they blink and move always in the same pattern. T.T Bear, Gabby Bear, Jabbee the StoryTeller, and my Italian talker "Funny the talking bear", all use this method to animate.
As do Talking Cooler, Fievel and Alf.
Some toys I can think of that do actually have real animation coding are Big Bird, Patty PlayPal and the Cricket series dolls.
I agree it is fascinating to see different animatronics! It isn't T.T, but I do have pictures of Jabbee inside that I may share here shorty. It is a simple but fascinating mechanism run by one motor and a series of gears.
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Post by FilthyAnimal on Apr 26, 2017 19:52:31 GMT -7
Congrats, he looks adorable! That's neat that you collect knockoffs, too. I'd totally love to see what you've collected!
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Post by lachlant1984 on May 14, 2017 4:09:50 GMT -7
Can I just make a slight correction to your comments about the animation signals used by Playskool and YES please DollyPrince? Those versions of Teddy Ruxpin apparently use FM based animatronic technology, not RF, if they used RF, they'd probably use some kind of wireless linkage from Teddy to some source of the animatronic signal. They use FM, frequency modulation.
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Post by DollyPrince on May 15, 2017 20:32:08 GMT -7
Can I just make a slight correction to your comments about the animation signals used by Playskool and YES please DollyPrince? Those versions of Teddy Ruxpin apparently use FM based animatronic technology, not RF, if they used RF, they'd probably use some kind of wireless linkage from Teddy to some source of the animatronic signal. They use FM, frequency modulation. Thank you for your correction. Perhaps Patty PlayPal may have used RF, I am not sure. |
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