Pixar Studios Tour

Great article on a visit to Pixar Studios by Moriarty from aintitcool.com. Sorry if the pictures don’t load.

THE INCREDIBLES At Pixar

The last Wednesday morning in February, I caught the 8:00 AM flight from Burbank to Oakland, then took a taxi to Emeryville, where a drive-on pass was waiting for me under my covert spy name, Drew McWeeny, allowing me to enter the headquarters of Pixar for the very first time. This is something I’ve wanted to do for quite a while, so despite the ungodly early hour, I was full of energy.

I was the first person from the group of journalists to arrive, giving me plenty of time to look around the lobby, which is actually a gigantic football-field length atrium, the centerpiece of the entire building.



As it was explained to me later, Steve Jobs originally proposed a building with one bathroom, something that would drive foot traffic to a central area all day long. Obviously, they’ve got more than one bathroom in the building, but just standing there and watching as everyone arrived to start their day, it was obvious that Jobs had managed the feat.

The mailboxes, the employee café, and the common room where all the games are all open into that atrium, and people lingered, talking, exchanging ideas and discussing the various projects they’re working on. It seemed like a fertile, creative environment, and I felt like Charlie Bucket holding a golden ticket as I examined the larger-than-life INCREDIBLES statues in the center of the atrium and the concept paintings hung on the walls.

I talked with a couple of guys who were also waiting there in the lobby, guys working with Pixar on an ancillary project. They sounded just as excited talking about the company as I’m sure I did, and it struck me: for hardcore animation fans, Pixar plays the same role that the Beatles must have for music fans in the ‘60s. We are living in a golden age, watching true giants in their primes, and each new film they put out is a joy because of the incredibly high genre defining standards that they hold themselves to. I’ll be the first to admit I wasn’t crazy about the teaser for Lasseter’s CARS, due now in 2006, but I know no one works harder to develop their films than this company. They have an unstoppable story department, and they work tirelessly. I’m confident that when we finally see the still-evolving film, it’ll be another tremendous winner.

By 10:30, several other reporters had arrived, and we were ready to begin the tour. We were introduced to Randy Nelson, who serves as Dean of Pixar University. Believe me when I say I mean this as a complimentary comparison… Nelson gives off a real strong Fred Rogers vibe. This guy is a true believer, and when he talks about Pixar, you get the feeling that he means everything he says, and it’s not just corporate speak that’s been impressed upon him through endless repetition.

It makes sense that he’d be in charge of the continuing education of everyone who works for Pixar. They offer classes to all of their employees, no matter what department they’re in, on all aspects of filmmaking. The theory is that they want everyone in the building to understand exactly what it is that the company does, so they can all appreciate the main goals of Pixar. The Pixar University building sits right next to the main animation building, joined by the pool and bordered by the soccer field. It’s a sixteen-acre property, just big enough that when you’re there, it’s all you can see, even though the Emeryville City Hall sits at the far end of the same block.

Nelson led us through several different galleries, featuring storyboards, color scripts and character sculptures…

… an awards case (where we were told that Lasseter’s two Oscars aren’t in the case because they live at his house, where he’s commissioned a series of seasonally-appropriate outfits for them, including an Oscar night tuxedo and matching evening gown, from a friend who designs clothes for BARBIE), gag sheets…

… and (my favorite) a set that was put together to inspire the animators on THE INCREDIBLES, a perfect recreation of the desk and wall of Mr. Incredible’s office, complete with a jar full of bent lead slugs labeled “Bullets That Bounced Off Me.â€?

He also led us through the section of the building where the animators actually work. Here’s where the Wonka factory comparison felt strongest. Instead of cubicles, each of the animators has a customized space. There was one guy who had this groovy corner office that was open on two sides, and he had no chair at all. He had the entire office set up so that he could work standing, like so:

That was a pretty extreme example of what someone could do with their space. A lot of the animators decided early on that they didn’t want cubicles, so instead, Pixar found these groovy little cottages that they bought for them. Walking through the animation department is like walking through a neighborhood for dwarves. Lots of little houses laid out along “streets,â€? each one with an address on the door.

The animators also have lounges set up so they can congregate and relax, including a jungle-themed lounge with piñatas hanging overhead.

One of the most amazing things we saw was the assembled hardware required to make Pixar’s films happen. The computer brain of Pixar is as big as I’d expected, and there’s something surreal about this serene room full of rack after rack after rack of black computer boards, nearly featureless, being the place where such memorable characters as Buzz and Woody and the Incredibles and Boo and Sully all live and breathe. There’s also something HAL9000 about the entire room, and I started to get worried that the computer was reading our lips as we stood looking in at it through the window.

Our tour ended in one of the Pixar screening rooms, where there was a presentation by Ann Brilz and Osnat Shurer, who produced the DVD. They showed us some of the special features, including the sensational “Jack-Jack Attack,â€? a new short cartoon created especially for the DVD. I’ll review the disc content later in this week’s column, but I’ll say that the pride Brilz and Shurer had in the disc was evident, and it’s a testament to the volume of their work that they just barely showed us a glimpse of the total running time in the full hour that we spent with them.

After lunch, held downstairs in the game room where one of the walls had a great MONSTERS INC. display, we rotated through our one-on-one interview time with Brad Bird, John Walker (who produced THE INCREDIBLES), Tony Fucile, the character designer and supervising animator, as well as Brilz and Shurer. I’ll bring you highlights from those interviews next week. It was a blast to sit down with Bird again, and to chat with Fucile for the first time since a Glendale Warner Bros. store signing back around the release of THE IRON GIANT.

Time was tight, though, and traffic was terrible, so I had to hustle to make my 5:30 flight out of Oakland. By the time I got home that evening, my INCREDIBLES DVD was sitting there waiting for me on the coffee table. Perfect end to a perfect-but-oh-so-short day.

March 22, 2005 | Filed Under Uncategorized 

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