Now in its sixth year, the Pacific Northwest Mouse Meet (PNW,) was held on June 28th, 2014.

Led by Planning Committee Chairman Don Morin, PNW seeks to give regional (and a few not-so-local) fans an event to gather, learn, and celebrate their common Disney interests.

One of the highlights of PNW is the wide roster of Disney luminaries they get to come and give talks and sign items each year.

This year, PNW featured three great speakers: Glenn Barker, Don Hahn, and Tony Baxter.

Glenn Barker was the Manager of the Audio/Video Department of WED throughout the 80’s, eventually becoming a Principal Media Designer–his current position. He has created the soundtracks for Space Mountain, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, and the Matterhorn at Disneyland, and was responsible for recording many of the orchestral soundtracks for the different EPCOT pavilions.

Soundworks Collection: Walt Disney Imagineers from Michael Coleman on Vimeo.

He gave a great talk on his history with the company, and demonstrated some of the component sounds that contribute to the depth of a given auditory environment. He also showed ride videos which showed off how the soundtrack matches and enhances the ride experience.

The next speaker was Producer/Director/Author Don Hahn, who notably produced “Beauty and the Beast” and “Lion King,” directed the documentary “Waking Sleeping Beauty,” and authored, most recently, “Brain Storm: Unleashing Your Creative Self.”

His talk centered around the concept of creativity, how it can be fostered, and how it often starts from the simple declarations “I am here, I am a unique voice, this is my world, let me show it to you.”

The last speaker of the day was Disney Legend and past Imagineer Tony Baxter.

His talk was very similar to the “Undiscovered Disneyland” presentation he gave at Expo 2013, but with different video showing Disneyland of the past. As always, it was a fascinating look at how the topography, the cast members, and the guests at Disneyland have changed over the decades.

Outside of the talks, there was still more for guests to enjoy: The day started off with a small orchestra playing Disney tunes for the masses of people waiting to “rope drop” the event.

Over at the charity raffle, where guests could try to win prizes such as a private Imagineer-led tour of Disneyland or hand-drawn art by Uncle Scrooge artist Don Rosa, incentives to purchase tickets included a poster from the recent film “Maleficent,” signed by producer Don Hahn.

The charities for this year were Ryman Arts and Seattle Children’s Hospital. Between the raffle, an extra Tony Baxter talk on Sunday, and donations from MEI & Mouse Fan Travel, $9,000 was raised for them.

There were also a number of “Picture Spot” locations around the convention center, representing all the different lands of the park.

Should your interests run towards old-school Disney video gaming, 62-bit Gaming had you covered.

There were also several tables of merchandise dealers, authors, vendors, podcasters, and even a snack booth, should you get hungry.

The party continued on at the official hotel as well, with a window-decorating contest that produced some fairly impressive entries, complete with sound and moving parts.

New for this year, was an additional talk given by Tony Baxter and Glenn Barker at the hotel the next day–“History of EPCOT and the Journey Into Imagination Attraction.” This was on the process they went through, conceptualizing and realizing the original Imagination pavilion.

Starting with his aborted concepts for both the Sea and the Land pavilions, Baxter traced the evolution of the Imagination pavilion through development, sponsorship, casting, and construction.

The talk culminated in a viewing of the ride-through video reconstruction showing the final product.

As a special treat, we were also shown a video in which Tony Baxter and a few other Imagineers participated in the old Image Works attraction “Dreamfinder’s School of Drama.” Afterwards, some lucky audience members won copies of the new Marvel comic book “Figment,” which Tony Baxter signed.

So all in all, PNW continues its run as an exceptionally well-organized convention. If it seemed a little more subdued this year, it made up for it with the additional talk on Sunday, which went a long way towards my only issue–its length. For people not in the area, the costs of a plane ticket, rental car, and hotel do add up when balanced against the (typically) one day of content. Personally, however, having been to around three or four of these by now, I would say that I have never finished the weekend thinking it had not been worth my time or money. If you have the opportunity to attend PNW next year (and book fast when those tickets come out, because they sell out in a matter of days,) I encourage you to put it on your Disney fan calendar–it’s well worth the trip.

Information about PNW can be found at their website, http://www.pnwmousemeet.com/

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